This isn’t going anywhere, so I’ll clarify my position one final time before I disengage.
Your entire fucking point is predicated on the idea that fascism is inevitable because change wasn’t happening fast enough, so harm reduction was functional worthless to pursue.
Harm reduction alone was functionally worthless to pursue, yes. Harm reduction is fine, desirable even, but not at the expense of antagonistic action. Prioritizing harm reduction over the antagonistic action that’s supposed to be facilitated by that harm reduction is putting the cart before the horse and self-defeating. By antagonistic action I’m mostly thinking of protests, civil disobedience, strikes and whatever Uncommitted was here, but for an easy example I’ll use the early to mid-2024 calls for Biden to step down. Doubling down on hard reduction entailed shutting down calls for Biden to step down to not jeopardize the anti-fascist united front, but I believe that to have been a mistake. The play was to jump on and amplify these calls so that Biden would step down sooner and open the way for a real primary, because it’s these sort of actions that give harm reduction meaning, otherwise it becomes simply kicking the can down the road. Harm reduction is necessary but not sufficient for fighting fascism, so it cannot happen at the expense of other necessary actions, such as coercing the Democrats into providing a viable unity platform. That’s why I called it farcical (which, yeah, I still stand by that characterization); it’s like filling a bowl with eggs and trying to make cake.
This isn’t going anywhere, so I’ll clarify my position one final time before I disengage.
Harm reduction alone was functionally worthless to pursue, yes. Harm reduction is fine, desirable even, but not at the expense of antagonistic action. Prioritizing harm reduction over the antagonistic action that’s supposed to be facilitated by that harm reduction is putting the cart before the horse and self-defeating. By antagonistic action I’m mostly thinking of protests, civil disobedience, strikes and whatever Uncommitted was here, but for an easy example I’ll use the early to mid-2024 calls for Biden to step down. Doubling down on hard reduction entailed shutting down calls for Biden to step down to not jeopardize the anti-fascist united front, but I believe that to have been a mistake. The play was to jump on and amplify these calls so that Biden would step down sooner and open the way for a real primary, because it’s these sort of actions that give harm reduction meaning, otherwise it becomes simply kicking the can down the road. Harm reduction is necessary but not sufficient for fighting fascism, so it cannot happen at the expense of other necessary actions, such as coercing the Democrats into providing a viable unity platform. That’s why I called it farcical (which, yeah, I still stand by that characterization); it’s like filling a bowl with eggs and trying to make cake.