• TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    So you made it up. Stop trying to sanitize the man’s words for your own needs. He said what he said. You just don’t like what he said. I’ll trust what he said:

    In 1956, I shall not go to the polls. I have not registered. I believe that democracy has so far disappeared in the United States that no “two evils” exist. There is but one evil party with two names, and it will be elected despite all I can do or say. There is no third party. On the Presidential ballot in a few states (seventeen in 1952), a “Socialist” Party will appear. Few will hear its appeal because it will have almost no opportunity to take part in the campaign and explain its platform. If a voter organizes or advocates a real third-party movement, he may be accused of seeking to overthrow this government by “force and violence.” Anything he advocates by way of significant reform will be called “Communist” and will of necessity be Communist in the sense that it must advocate such things as government ownership of the means of production; government in business; the limitation of private profit; social medicine, government housing and federal aid to education; the total abolition of race bias; and the welfare state. These things are on every Communist program; these things are the aim of socialism. Any American who advocates them today, no matter how sincerely, stands in danger of losing his job, surrendering his social status and perhaps landing in jail. The witnesses against him may be liars or insane or criminals. These witnesses need give no proof for their charges and may not even be known or appear in person. They may be in the pay of the United States Government. A.D.A.’s and “Liberals” are not third parties; they seek to act as tails to kites. But since the kites are self-propelled and radar-controlled, tails are quite superfluous and rather silly.

    Why I Won’t Vote: W.E.B. Du Bois

    • lingh0e
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      10 months ago

      I’m not trying to sanitize anything, I’m saying that people like you who seemingly never read the whole essay love quoting it out of context and acting like it absolves them for being too edgy to vote.

      • TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Please. It’s manipulation and unseemly. Find your own civil rights icon that supports your point and stop whitewashing history.

        • lingh0e
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          10 months ago

          Providing context is manipulation and whitewashing? Sure sure.

          • TokenBoomer@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            Absolutely, when no context is needed. Dubois wrote an article to express his intent. He doesn’t need any interpretation.