If you don't vote, you have no right to complain about the next set of assholes. Here in the UK, the British National Party (a far-right fringe party) got two seats in the last European Parliament elections simply because turnout had fallen so low for the main parties. A lot of people are rightly ashamed at not bothering to vote. The only people who benefit from apathy are extremists and demagogues who can reliably r…
No action removes your right to complain. Many people may have their own legitimate reasons not to vote.
That said, those who don't must understand the implications of their actions (like the example you give).
If you vote for a losing candidate, then you can complain that your voice has not been heard. If you vote for a winning candidate, then you can complain when they break their promises. If you don't vote, you have nothing to complain about but your own laziness.
What if you disagree with the system of giving everyone a vote being a valid way to decide things?
Go and build your own country. With blackjack! And hookers!
If you have an obligation to vote, then it's an obligation to make an informed vote. If you haven't attempted to evaluate your decision carefully and can't make an informed vote, please don't vote. Informed voting > not voting > uninformed voting Greg Mankiw has a column on this: http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/11/election-day-approach...
I'm not surprised he makes that argument. A higher voter turnout generally benefits the left, as the poor are less frequent voters. Everyone has the right to vote, informed or not, and I don't think anyone should undermine that right. There's always going to be someone making the argument that they are more informed.
Also, the only acceptable way to show that you don't want to vote is to go and cast a blank or invalid vote.
If you have an obligation to vote, then it's an obligation to make an informed vote. If you haven't attempted to evaluate your decision carefully and can't make an informed vote, please don't vote. Informed voting > not voting > uninformed voting Greg Mankiw has a column on this: http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/11/election-day-approach...
Well, as the chance that the vote one casts is actually making a difference is so miniscule and the cost of informing yourself about the poltical agenda of parties rather high it is rational and utility maximising not to vote and to stay ignorant.
If you have an obligation to vote, then it's an obligation to make an informed vote. If you haven't attempted to evaluate your decision carefully and can't make an informed vote, please don't vote. Informed voting > not voting > uninformed voting Greg Mankiw has a column on this: http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/11/election-day-approach...
This column was originally written in Oct 2000. I wonder if he still holds the same opinion. I think that the problem with assuming that the uninformed shouldn't vote is that you assume that all of the uninformed don't vote, or that the distribution is uniform. This is far from the case. It might be the case that we should encourage everyone to vote, so that all of the uninformed votes might cancel each other out.
Bryan Caplan argues that in his field (economics), uninformed votes don't cancel each other out. The average opinions of the uninformed (non-economist laymen) differ consistently from the average opinions of the informed (professional economists): http://www.cato-unbound.org/2006/11/06/bryan-caplan/the-myth...
I wouldn't be surprised if the same were true of other skills useful to high-quality voting, such as military strategy, education, criminology and history.
I always believed that not voting is also a vote, but you are fined in Australia if you do not show up and cast your ballot. The only way to say 'none of the above' is by filing an informal vote. This is a de-facto way of saying that you don't like any of the options, and at least in Australia this informal vote is tracked and parties take notice of it. In the USA if you vote to not vote, Washington bundles you in wi…
Option B would be pretty interesting, and might provide a decent incentive for people to vote. However, if people aren't likely to vote anyway, why would they care how much representation they have in Congress? We effectively do have a "none of the above" option: don't select anyone and still cast the ballot. However, it would be better if there was an explicit "No vote" option. The biggest problem with voting not be…
«The biggest problem with voting not being mandatory is
that a lot of people don't have the opportunity because
they can't get off work. If you made voting mandatory (or
at least made election day a paid holiday), this
impediment might be alleviated.»
An alternative, as it's done in Spain, is to give everyone the right to leave their jobs in order to vote. To alleviate things for businesses, all elections happen on Sundays.
If you vote for a losing candidate, then you can complain that your voice has not been heard. If you vote for a winning candidate, then you can complain when they break their promises. If you don't vote, you have nothing to complain about but your own laziness.
What if you disagree with the system of giving everyone a vote being a valid way to decide things?
Because, like it or not, that is the system and you can only change the system from within.
"I disagree with the system" is intellectually lazy and in my experience merely a cover story for apathy.
If you vote for a losing candidate, then you can complain that your voice has not been heard. If you vote for a winning candidate, then you can complain when they break their promises. If you don't vote, you have nothing to complain about but your own laziness.
What if you disagree with the system of giving everyone a vote being a valid way to decide things?
What's the alternative? I can't think of one that is morally acceptable.
If you vote for a losing candidate, then you can complain that your voice has not been heard. If you vote for a winning candidate, then you can complain when they break their promises. If you don't vote, you have nothing to complain about but your own laziness.
This is wrong. One shouldn't have to vote to be left alone. Reality is different, I know, but it isn't one's laziness that is to blame. (PS: I vote.)
I agree (more or less) with the parent: If you don't vote, you lose the privilege of complaining.
But just because your candidate loses doesn't mean that your voice hasn't been heard. It's just that more people who voted disagree with you than agree with you.
In Australia voting is mandatory. If you're registered to vote and you don't you can get fined. If no one is registered to vote at your address you'll tend to get lots of mail about it (but ultimately, staying off the electoral roll isn't difficult). I used to think this was a bad idea as it forced people to vote who didn't really care. In recent years I've come around to the opposite point of view based pretty much…
I am Yank, Arab and Somali (I hold three passports) and I will soon be an Aussie, via marriage. I have spent a year in Australia. My feeling is that Aussies are not really as political as Americans. American voting is under-informed and has low turn out, but at least the few percentage of electorate that vote actually care . Aussies .. I am not sure if they don't care, or if they're just good at hiding their politica…
I think you'll find that people in NSW wholly consider the state government to be mindless wankers, because they are. State governments all over Australia are completely inept. Most people will have someone in Federal politics that they like, though and I think the view generally of Federal politics is far less cynical, and where true political allegiances come to light.