Voting is Not Harm Reduction An Indigenous Perspective February 2020 – www.indigenousaction.org
Zine format printable PDF download: Voting is Not Harm Reduction Zine-FINAL-PRINT (9.8MB)
"When proclamations are made that “voting is harm reduction,” it’s never clear how less harm is actually calculated. Do we compare how many millions of undocumented Indigenous Peoples have been deported? Do we add up what political party conducted more drone strikes? Or who had the highest military budget? Do we factor in pipelines, mines, dams, sacred sites desecration? Do we balance incarceration rates? Do we compare sexual violence statistics? Is it in the massive budgets of politicians who spend hundreds of millions of dollars competing for votes?
Though there are some political distinctions between the two prominent parties in the so-called U.S., they all pledge their allegiance to the same flag. Red or blue, they’re both still stripes on a rag waving over stolen lands that comprise a country built by stolen lives.
We don’t dismiss the reality that, on the scale of U.S. settler colonial violence, even the slightest degree of harm can mean life or death for those most vulnerable. What we assert here is that the entire notion of “voting as harm reduction” obscures and perpetuates settler-colonial violence, there is nothing “less harmful” about it, and there are more effective ways to intervene in its violences."
I’ll start by saying that I don’t totally disagree with your points. I think a simple blanket statement like “don’t vote” is wholely harmful, and only serves to perpetuate apathy and further oppression.
That said, the message here is plainly more than calling for people to abstain from voting. Its a call for militant direct action, which electoralism serves to pacify.
I don’t think I can express it more eloquently than the author, and I don’t think that a particular excerpt can do justice to the point, but this part seems salient.
One person devoting their time, energy, and organizational capacity to liberation can do more to help their community than any number of people voting for a lesser evil chosen by the oppressors.
The point is not to dissuade leftists from voting, it’s to persuade them to take action. In the case of Indigenous Action that isn’t a vague call to action either. There’s active resistance in need of material support on Turtle Island currently.