Like so many people on here, you’re talking about voting in the abstract. I’m talking about voting in reality. I live in Washington State, currently, one of the safest states in the union. There is zero chance my vote will have any effect on the outcome.

I have a better analogy than a “vaccine.” For the vast majority of people, voting in our “democracy” is more like the “Walk” button at an intersection. It’s a placebo designed to make people feel like they’re in control, when they actually are not.

In a few months, there will be a convention. There’s about a 35 percent chance that it will have to go to a second round, at which point the superdelegates are going to come into play. If Sanders wins a strong plurality, they could still hand the nomination to someone else, like say, Elizabeth Warren, who is currently in fourth place right now.

So even if Sanders is the choice of the overwhelming majority of individual primary voters, the nomination could go to someone else.

When all those people in the DNC—who have both power and a clearly stated desire to deny Sanders the nomination—are making those decisions, they’re going to have to factor in the risk that we will boycott.

So in effect my vote in the General is useless, but the threat of withholding my vote has value insofar as it can provide insurance against a fundamentally undemocratic outcome that will, without a doubt, result in Trump’s reelection.

Does that make sense to you?