Fact: The only thing standing between us and a Trump-Putin-FOX style government is the Democratic Party. This is why what we might call traditional conservatives are joining the Democratic coalition. They don’t like most of the Democratic Party’s policies, but the Democratic Party is rejecting authoritarianism while the current Republican Party, which has swung far to the right, is embracing it.
People construct elaborate doomsday what-if scenarios and overlook the obvious: What if not enough people vote Democratic so the Republicans get control of Congress?
Military coups are very 20th century. Modern authoritarians come to power through legal means and then once in power, they batter democratic institutions in order to remain in power. The solution is not to allow them into office in the first place by voting against them.
This is why so many of us are worried about voter suppression.
The Easiest Way to Suppress the Vote is to Discourage Voting
There are two ways to suppress the vote: (1) make it hard for people to vote by putting hurdles in their way, and (2) make them not want to vote by persuading them that there is no point.
The second way is easier, less expensive, and more effective. People don’t like it when you tell them they can’t vote and they often become more determined. Parties can organize to get around the hurdles.
It’s easier to persuade them that there is no point.
Voter suppression in the form of discouraging voting comes from three different sides:
- Foreign actors who want to interfere in our elections,
- Domestic actors who want particular people not to vote, and
- Domestic actors who suppress the vote incidentally. (It’s not their goal and they may not realize they are doing it.)
For the past 6 years, my volunteer work has mostly been in the area of voter protection. I thus feel dismayed by anything that discourages voting.
The Mueller Investigation and 2017 Senate Intelligence Report Exposed On-Line Voter Suppression Tactics
One of the indictments brought by Special Counsel Robert Mueller was against the Internet Research Agency IRA), a Russian organization designed to influence American voters. The indictment reads like a “how to discourage people from voting” manual.
In January 2017, the United States Intelligence Community – Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections report referred to the IRA as Troll Farm. The IRA created thousands of fake accounts that purported to be Americans. More than 1,000 employees reportedly worked in a single building of the IRA in 2015, pretending to be Americans and posting social media messages.
Americans, who had never experienced a Russian-style disinformation campaign were easily duped and often interacted with St. Petersburg-based trolls, engaging with them and amplifying their message.
The IRA began with trust-building. They posted content intended to appeal to their target audience. For example, they appealed to Trump critics by attacking Trump. Then a separate army of trolls appealed to Evangelicals by posting Biblical quotations. After building trust, they would deploy payload content designed to influence voters. For example, if Black Americans were protesting, they’d disseminate content blaming Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s policies for the unrest, and claimed that Hillary Clinton was not working on behalf of Black Americans. Their content echoed and was amplified by genuine American left-wing Hillary haters.
The thing about this form of voter suppression is that it’s shadowy and cannot be measured.
Some Accounts Use These Tactics Naturally
Domestic accounts (real Americans) sometimes use these tactics naturally. Take, for example, the “attack accounts” on Twitter. Anyone active on Twitter knows who they are. During the Trump era, they effectively attacked Trump and as a result, built large followings. This was the trust-building stage. Once Trump was removed from power, they began attacking Democrats. Some don’t know how to do anything other than attack. Some have no idea how a democratic government works so they are unable to comment intelligently on the workings of a democratic administration. Some hate Democrats as much as they hate Republicans.
They built a following by attacking, and it’s hard to abandon a formula that works. They don’t care if their predictions are wrong. If they make an incorrect prediction or a claim that turns out to be factually incorrect, they pivot back to attacking Republicans (trust-building).
Moreover, as the Facebook whistleblower testified, emotions like anger and rage invite more social media engagement, and it’s fun to be popular.
Other people with large social media accounts seem to thrive on doom. Some appear to want doom. I am not a psychologist, so I can’t explain why. Maybe some doomsayers want to be proven right, so they unwittingly use tactics to bring about doom. Maybe some are just sadistic.
Others genuinely want to bring down the American government.
Why Some Americans Want To Bring Down the American Government
I’ll divide voters into ‘right’ and ‘left.” This is the traditional way to present the political spectrum:
When I say left-wing, I mean anyone in the blue. Right-wing is anyone in the red.
Right-Wing American Government Hatred
Some on the right-wing believe that the American government is illegitimate because they think it has become corrupted. These are the people who don’t like what America has become since the 1950s. They want to go back to the good old days of white men in charge.
When they say the American government is corrupt, they mean “corrupt” in the sense of decay or decomposition:
They believe that the purity of the nation is being defiled. They believe that we are moving away from the real America (which they think is white and Protestant). They feel that something is being taken from them and that the government has become illegitimate.
The belief that the government was illegitimate led to the insurrection.
Left-Wing Government Hatred
This comes from disillusionment. Democratic institutions are imperfect because they are run by mere mortals and because there is constant pushback. Democracy is slow-moving and grinding work that requires compromise and give and take. Also, there is constant pushback, and people who want a kleptocracy have pushed our institutions far to the right.
Left-wing government haters believe a government that isn’t fair is illegitimate. When left-wing government haters use the word “corrupt” they mean it in the sense of “dishonest and improper.” Money in politics is an example. The right-wing doesn’t see this as “corrupt” because most people with piles of money are white and male. The left-wing sees this as corrupt because it creates unfairness.
(This post on the appeal of authoritarianism helps explain why people want to torpedo our government.)
Left-Wing (and fake Left-Wing) Voter Suppression
Last week there was an uptick in social media comments in my feed along the lines of: “I voted Democratic last time, but too angry at the Democrats to vote for them so I’m not voting.” The timing was no coincidence: We have an election around the corner.
After I posted this . . .
A bunch of people (or troll accounts, it’s hard to tell which) responded with some form of, “We voted for Democratic candidates last time and the Democrats have done nothing. So now what are we supposed to do? Vote harder?”
Like this:
After someone called me a “Vote Harder Democrat” I poked around and discovered that the language was coming from a few large well-known anti-Democratic Party accounts with large followings:
“Vote harder” is a silly phrase. It assumes we vote once and all problems are solved, and that civic responsibility begins and ends with voting. But it’s effective in making people think voting is pointless.
Notice this set of replies:
The tactic of two accounts engaged in a conversation was a tactic used by the IRA. The intention is to influence others. Notice that the first person uses the “a lot of people are saying” ploy, and the second slips into the assumption that we are actually in a dictatorship.
After I tweeted this, I was hit by a barrage of accounts accusing me of “blaming the voters” and “attacking the Democratic base.”
Like this:
Obviously, people who “vote left rather than for Democrats” are not part of the Democratic “base.” Moreover, in what world does Trump not attack Republicans who step out of line?
After someone accused me of trying to “guilt” people into voting in a way they didn’t want to vote, I tweeted an obviously true statement (if you don’t vote Democratic, you will have to accept responsibility if the Democrats lose). Notice the responses:
The idea of “scapegoating” voters for the outcome of an election struck me as preposterous. Then I understood that these accounts are arguing that if Republicans come to power because the voters didn’t vote Democratic, it wasn’t the fault of the voters: It was the fault of the Democratic leadership for being so bad that nobody could vote for them:
The argument is that if people vote Democratic, nothing will “change.” It will be more of the same because “both sides are corrupt” and the only solution is to “dismantle” the federal government:
Here’s the problem with “dismantle the federal government” or “burn it all down and build something better”: Democratic institutions cannot be created overnight. That’s why, Timothy Snyder, in On Tyranny, says that preserving democracy requires defending our institutions.
On the other hand, the task of improving them is a never-ending task because there is always pushback and because institutions are run by mere mortals who are imperfect. Improving our institutions is slow, tedious work. “Burn it all down and start over” promises a quick result. In fact, it creates a power vaccum.
How the “Harbingers of Doom” Lead to Voter Suppression
An account that actually describes herself as a “Harbinger of Doom” posted a thread that went viral about how absolutely hopeless our political system is. The problem with her thread was that it was based on a legal error. She assumed that the only way to pass legislation to codify abortion rights is if the Democrats elect 60 members of Congress. She offered mathematical proof that this cannot possibly be done given the current political divide.
Several people, myself included, told her that her premise was wrong: In fact, 51 Senators (or 50 + Kamala Harris) can do a filibuster carveout, or exception (what is sometimes called the “nuclear option.”)
She ignored the people who pointed out her error. My guess is that she found her new fame (a thread that went viral and a following that grew rapidly) so much fun that she didn’t care if it was based on an error.
Not surprisingly, her doomsday thread generated responses like this one (if you’re not accustomed to Twitter, here’s how to read it. The bottom Tweet is from the doomsayer. The top Tweet is a person’s response (in what’s called a Quote Tweet):
A few more:
and this:
There were thousands of comments like the above. The Harbinger of Doom is highly critical of the Republicans and supports pro-choice and other liberal positions. In other words, her politics are on the left side of the spectrum. Whether or not it was her intention, she is spreading the message that there is no point in voting.
It seems to me that gaining fame and building a platform based on a lie is no different from what Fox and QAnon do, and is equally destructive.
But it’s so effective that it’s hard to resist.
The “None of This Matters Because . . . ” Political Nihilists
Along the same lines are the “none of this matters” left-wing nihilists. For example, any time a new development occurs in the January 6 Congressional investigation or the DOJ probe, a hoard of accounts post something like this:
(I’ve addressed the moans of “there are never any consequences” in this post.)
In response to the upcoming hearings in which the Congressional committee intends to make the public aware of everything that happened on and leading up to January 6, there are thousands of posts like this one:
The logic goes like this: Unless X happens (where X is far in the future and may not happen at all) nothing matters. Nihilism is the belief that nothing has any meaning. What I’m calling “political nihilists” say that nothing that happens in the public arena has any meaning unless (or until) they get the specific results they want.
In fact, everything matters. Each of the 800+ indictments filed so far in the insurrection matter. Both impeachments mattered. The fact that the Trump Org has been indicted for fraud matters.
It all matters. The idea that this doesn’t matter is a lie. Like all lies, it is destructive.
It also could be self-fulfilling if political nihilism causes voters to get discouraged and think it’s all pointless.
The Solution
If you see small accounts with small followings acting like trolls, ignore them. Responding draws attention to them, which is what they want.
On the other hand, large influential accounts spreading actual falsehoods must be called out.
If the nothing-matters doomsayers are getting to you, my suggestion is to step away from the screen and immerse yourself in volunteer work. You’ll feel better and you’ll know you’re helping. Here are my suggestions.
An eye-opening analysis which I will need to re-read occasionally.