> “Over time, politicians’ views are shaped by the voters. If you show up to vote, you’ll be part of that process. If you don’t, you won’t, and you shouldn’t th

> “Over time, politicians’ views are shaped by the voters. If you show up to vote, you’ll be part of that process. If you don’t, you won’t, and you shouldn’t then be surprised when none of the people running for office share your views.” This just simply is not true. If you are ignorant about facts pertaining to issues, then to the extent that your vote influences future policy shifts, it would do so in the wrong direction, or at least add noise to the process that knowledgeable people have to overcome. An ignorant voter could for example directly and unwittingly vote against their own views if they aren’t informed about the relationship between their preferred outcomes, policies that could potentially achieve those outcomes, and politicians’ likelihood of adopting particular positions, being lobbied by corporate interests, etc. For most politicians and most issues, most everyday people absolutely have zero knowledge about these situations that would imply their preferences deserve to be factored into the decision (from a statistical optimization point of view). > “If you show up to vote, you’ll be part of that process.” Yes, but you could be playing a harmful part of that process. Showing up to vote is not unequivocally always helpful. If you vote based on ignorance, even totally separate from meta debates about how to choose the right morals or norms subjectively, you could cause harm. “Being part of the process” could mean you are effectively noise-jamming democracy because your uninformed opinion about the best course of action shouldn’t be listened to. > “If you don’t, you won’t,” This is just wrong. You can “play a part” by abstaining from voting. In fact it can be a critical part if you know you are personally uninformed about the technical specifics of an issue or don’t know a candidate’s history of being a corporate shill, or you base your vote on a single issue that turns out not to be very urgent for society, etc. Not voting when you don’t have special knowledge of the best policy or best candidate can be an incredibly important way to meaningfully participate in government, and may often be much more socially responsible than voting from a position of ignorance. Despite all this, I still concede that if a person doesn’t care about “using their vote to do good” and chooses instead to care about “having their voice heard” and arguing (however ignorantly) in favor of their preferences, then they could justifiably reach the conclusions you give in your comments. Just not if their goal is to optimize the chance of the best policy outcome according to their views weighted by their expertise in the topic. In that case, abstaining from the vote can often be the optimal choice, even in terms of trying to get policy reformed in the direction you prefer.