Beyond Apathy or Surrender at the Polls
The hit 2010 action role-playing game Fallout: New Vegas opens with a cutscene in which minor antagonist Benny remarks, “Truth is, the game was rigged from the start,” before shooting the player character. This harsh introduction to a game set in an inhospitable and post-nuclear Mojave Desert perfectly captures the feeling of voting in modern America. At least, it captures the dread of getting ready to vote for the first time in this imperial core.
Like many KU students, and an estimated 8.3 million young adults nationwide, I am newly aged into the eligible population of American voters for the 2024 presidential election (Medina & Suzuki). Before me, I see a broken political system, out-of-touch and lifeless candidates, and a hateful, imperialist nation, all of which I utterly despise. While my more radical sentiments may be somewhat exclusive, those broad feelings of dejection and apathy are commonplace among youth voters, as the plurality in a Harvard survey agree their votes will not make a real difference (Katlyn).
What difference is there to be made with the major party nominees? Both tickets base their policy platforms in a brutish, imperialist worldview, in which the evil drug-running migrants are flooding the southern border with fentanyl and taking over all the condos, in which Israel is America’s truest and most moral ally which must be allowed to devastate West Asia (often erroneously referred to as the Middle East) in perpetuity, and in which climate change cannot be addressed if, heaven forbid, we allow “Red China" to manufacture the solar panels and wind turbines to address the crisis. Young voters are only naturally repulsed by this odious political environment, in which the two factions of the same bourgeoise ruling class rush to create a more competent brand of Trump-era American fascism, disguised by democratic facades, that will continue to facilitate imperial terror and climate catastrophe around the globe.
This all raises a critical dichotomy. Should I, and those newly minted eligible voters like me, give in to the pull of apathy, or should we surrender to the system? Shall we avoid the ballot box entirely, scorning the choice of who will next rule Babylon, or walk proudly into our polling place in the name of Brat-themed, “harm-reducing” Palestinian genocide? The former presents a life of informed nonengagement, knowing enough to recognize the game is rigged, yet then choosing inaction over any attempt to upset the game’s twisted rules. The latter presents a life of complicity, always knowing that whomever you voted for president, they are now the face of empire, exploitation, death, and reaction for a majority of the globe. Thankfully, however, there is another way. This critical dichotomy of apathy versus surrender is a false dichotomy at that.
There is no need to wallow in inaction nor suffer the crushing weight of guilt from the decision whether to vote. For those first-time prospective voters like me, who understand the hideousness of this empire’s political system, I make an unapologetic call-to-arms: Be a kook. “Waste" your vote. Vote third party and walk out of that ballot box with a smile on your face. When you hate the game being played, do not sit there crossing your arms glumly, or worse, play the game the way the ruling class wants you to play it. Make the move everyone calls wrong. Take the rules of the game and throw them in the ruling class’s faces with your selection, even write-in, of candidates who at least have the decency to oppose genocide.
Dr. Jill Stein with the Green Party has this anti-genocide decency, along with the further decency of recognizing the climate crisis cooking the planet at the hands of the profit-motive. Dr. Cornel West with his independent campaign is also a fine choice for those rejecting the calamities American empire unleashes on the world. The most decent choice, in my summation, is Claudia De la Cruz with the Party for Socialism and Liberation, taking a forward stance against all aspects of capitalism’s disastrous grip over the world enforced through U.S. imperialism. Even in Kansas, where all these decent presidential candidates must be written in, the rejection of a wicked system with ballots for decency is far superior to disengagement or complicity in the evils of empire.
Admittedly, none of Jill Stein, Cornel West, nor Claudia De la Cruz are going to be the next President of the United States. That horror will fall to one of the major party nominees, and no third party is a presently competitive force in American politics. However, to have stood for something, to have rejected genocide, whether red or blue, in favor of this small action against the system, will be a badge of honor as I cast my first ballot, refusing to legitimize the systemic genocide with my vote. If more in my generation and beyond can adopt this mindset, standing up against a duopolistic system of global oppression, perhaps then we can at least make the major parties sweat over the cause against their evils. As the climate catastrophe unfolds, and as the American empire continues to decline, those currently labeled kooks and spoilers may find themselves part of an emerging real movement against what is in favor of what may be, a world founded on liberation, equality, and human dignity.
The comedy to Benny’s line in Fallout: New Vegas, is that the game was never rigged from the start. The player character rises from the grave and can go on to shape the Mojave in any which way, most often to Benny’s demise. So do not give in to the naysayers. Be that kook. Be that third party, vote-wasting spoiler. Join me in casting my first ballot for any decent candidate rejecting the oppressive empire and system blighting this world, because in the end, humanity will triumph.
Works cited
Medina, Alberto, and Sara Suzuki. “41 Million Members of Gen Z Will Be Eligible to Vote in 2024”. Tufts’ CIRCLE, 2023.
Obsidian Entertainment. “Fallout: New Vegas”. 2010.
Vu, Kaitlyn. “Engaged & Disillusioned: Insights on Youth Turnout for 2024.” Harvard Politics, 2024.
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