Voters today

Lol and you and I voting third party leads to that outcome how exactly?

Of all the terrible things happening, I think it’s people’s hopelessly terrible understanding of politics that makes me the most depressed right now.

Edit: I don’t like how negative this comment is so I want to add some possible solutions. Change requires collective action. Individual votes are insignificant to the point of meaninglessness.

There are three main strategies I can see to create a force for progressive or leftist change.

1. Change the political system so that third parties become viable. This is tough because the duopoly doesn’t want it, and without a party where is your base of power? So I don’t think it’s particularly viable on its own—but there are orgs that push for this, and they have the advantage of being nonpartisan and can appeal to many people of many political persuasions. So if you want to make this your priority, tap into some of those organizations. But this also means ignoring pressing crises of today in the hope that reforming the electoral system will allow us to address them in the future. But of this there is no guarantee—it’s just as likely a fascist party will gain from your efforts as a leftist one.
2. Achieve a takeover from the inside of the Democratic Party. This is basically how the republicans went from conservatives to fascists. It might be the easiest of the three—but that doesn’t mean it will be easy. It means people need to set aside their distaste for democrats and the system and put a lot of effort into attending local meetings, voting for delegates, etc. It also has the drawback that the system itself has a tendency to corrupt reformers and bring them in line with its logic.
3. Create political power outside of a direct political party. Personally I think this might be the best approach if your goals are to radically transform society. There are many directions one could take, organizing with DSA or another org that makes endorsements, union organizing, mutual aid, etc. Basically you want to organize a mass of people who can sway society by acting in unison to either impose costs or benefits on those you wish to influence—or to directly enact or disrupt programs yourselves. The downside is that this is very very difficult and it may take years of going nowhere to organize enough people to really have an influence. But because the other two operate within existing systems of power, it has the greatest potential to bring about large transformations in society. But only if you put in the work and enough people join you.