There are a lot of white, western, “expert on autocracies“ tweeting threads right now emphasizing the importance of voting for the Democrats, while #ArabTwitter is laughing and wondering what famous autocrats in history actually gave a fuck about votes

You can actually listen to people who have lived under and/or escaped autocracy...if you can handle listening to people who aren’t British, American or white.

I’m not saying “don’t vote”, I’m saying that your “autocracy experts” may have graduated from the school of reddit or something if they’re telling you that votes impress autocrats.

I’m also saying “put your American exceptionalism aside once in a while and get some advise from people you usually don’t seek advise from”. Activists from the Middle East know a lot about this.

Frankly we should have applied for ODIHR election monitoring...but you know...the US isn’t one of those countries that needs election monitoring