Attempts to Make Change a Casualty Once AgainThe campaigns of Joe Biden and Donald Trump have focused on the presidential election being decisive for the future. People are to vote as though "your lives depend on it" (Michelle Obama), and "the stakes have never been higher" (Vice-President Mike Pence). This focus serves to remove the people, with their broad and persistent resistance, as the decisive factor in shaping the future. It hides the existing relations of power that guarantee a government of, by and for the rich, which cannot also be a government of, by and for the people. That is the reality life has repeatedly revealed. And it is precisely because there is a growing reckoning among the people -- as seen in demands of millions for equality, an end to government racism and human rights for all -- that this election is being presented as decisive. It is to divert the movements for empowerment, where people are taking matters into their own hands and speaking out in their own name, with their own demands. At the National Democratic Convention Biden specifically appealed to the youth, "For all the young people who have known only an America of rising inequity and shrinking opportunity. They deserve to experience America's promise in full."
Using sleight of hand to shift from "our" to "your," Obama is trying to equate "the basic tenets of our democracy" -- meaning those of the U.S. Constitution that keep power in the hands of the descendants of the "white men of property" who constituted the United States of America in the first place -- to "your democracy" and "your power." In this way, the power of the youth supposedly lies in voting for the very ruling class forces responsible for the current crises, whether it be the failures of providing for the people during the pandemic, the racist police violence and killings, the unemployment, evictions and poverty, or the climate disasters and continuing wars of aggression. The presumption is that power is not imparted by collective united action in defence of the rights of all. What is called the responsibility of citizens then is not to advance and harmonize individual, collective and social interests so as to move society forward and modernize the democracy. It is not to fight for a new direction for the country which puts political and economic affairs in the hands of the people. No, the responsibility of the youth is to vote for a system that has never provided equality or guaranteed the rights of all, but only promises to do so. There is a striving by the youth and workers rising up today to be decision-makers over all political and economic matters that impact their lives. There is a drive for empowerment of the people to govern and decide. That is the new direction that can provide for a democracy where all are equal members of the polity and where there is accountability -- not the ongoing impunity, racism and inequality inherent in the "basic tenets" of U.S.-style democracy. The effort to both divert and divide the people based on who they vote for and whether they vote, and to direct energy and resources into voting, is to blame them for whatever happens next. The issue for the people is not who gets elected but rather how best to further advance the current struggles for rights and empowerment and how to use elections to further unleash this fight for the New: new arrangements, a new direction, a democracy of the people's own making. (Photo: F. Zuccarella)
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Barack Obama
specifically focused on the resistance movement, "I am also asking you
to believe in your own ability -- to embrace your own responsibility as
citizens -- to make sure that the basic tenets of our democracy endure.
Because that's what's at stake right now. Our democracy. So they're
hoping to make it as hard as possible for you to vote, and to convince
you that your vote doesn't matter. That's how they win. That's how they
get to keep making decisions that affect your life, and the lives of
the people you love. That's how a democracy withers, until it's no
democracy at all. We can't let that happen. Do not let them take away
your power. Don't let them take away your democracy. Make a plan right
now for how you're going to get involved and vote."