5 ms·

I’d argue we want to make the process easier. The internal handling of votes should be harden as you explain, but helping more people to vote should be the goa

by hrktb 6y ago

I’d argue we want to make the process easier. The internal handling of votes should be harden as you explain, but helping more people to vote should be the goal. The reverse is also an attack on democracy, and we already see this at so many scales. Like setting voting stations at places easier to access for a specific portion of the population (right next to churches on sundays, next to police stations, hard to reach by public transport places, etc.). Reliable online voting would alleviate these kind of issues. Not saying it’s easy, but we should at least try.

dividuum 6y ago
Totally agree. I’ve voted in every election since I’m 18. So far all voting booths have been in walking distance. IIRC all have been on a Sunday, so it doesn’t conflict with work for most people.
sam_lowry_ 6y ago
If you want more people to vote, then just pass a law that mandates all citizens have to vote. That's how it is done in Belgium. Think of it. If your choice is ether vote or risk a fine, you'd rather go and vote. If you go and vote, you'll learn at least a bit about the choices you have to make in the ballot. P.S. While Belgium got mandatory voting right, it completely messed up electronic voting. I remember being an assessor in a polling station with electronic voting. People voted, then the head of the voting station took 3 1⁄2-inch floppy disks out of the machine, put them in an envelope and drove away to the district polling committee. There was not counting, no protocol to sign. Nothing. I was appalled.
- godelski 6y ago
  > If your choice is ether vote or risk a fine This is ABSOLUTELY not what I want. I for one want voting to be extremely accessible. Everyone that wants to vote can. The goal isn't to make everyone vote but rather that everyone has the ability to vote. That you don't have to take time off to vote. That it is easy. Universally accessible, not universally mandated.
  - madeofpalk 6y ago
    What happens though is that once you make voting compulsory, you have to make voting as easy as possible.
    - true_religion 6y ago
      You could simply mandate that voting be done on a federal holiday. That won't help everyone, but it will help most people who are trying to vote physically.
      - madeofpalk 6y ago
        Australia, which has mandatory voting, also mandates that voting is on a weekend.
        sam_lowry_ 6y ago
        Same for Belgium. Voting is always on Sunday.
  - xeromal 6y ago
    What's wrong with mandated voting?
    - foxrider 6y ago
      People who has no business voting voting. Imagine how many people would vote - not from the informed voter perspective. They'll most likely vote for the candidate they remember in a positive light. Imagine how much more sway would a big ad campaign have. I would be ok if a blank ballot would be the least effort option with no strings attached, but with a "wasting your vote" being a stigma and a part of the culture I see no need in any mandate. I just really don't want people who can't be bothered to go to a polling station on a holiday specifically made for voting to caste their vote to vote at all. Some times gatekeeping certain things is ok. There must be a balance.
- rustybelt 6y ago
  Yep, and let people vote for a longer period of time. Having a voting week or month instead of a day.
  - sam_lowry_ 6y ago
    Nope, spanning voting over several days makes it easy to hack the electoral process. In Belarus, they voted for 5 days and people are out in the streets for 5 weeks to reclaim their votes. Today is the last of three voting days in Rissia, and it looks like the results will be totally made up.
bobthepanda 6y ago
You can do it without the security issues of online though. For example every election in Washington ballots are mailed out to every address on file, it’s very easy to print a ballot online if you didn’t get it in the mail, and until recently there have been no supposed issues with mailing ballots (postage is prepaid), plus there are dedicated dropoff boxes as well. And even with all that convenience turnout was 65% in 2016, though it is expected to be higher this year.
tsimionescu 6y ago
Reliable online voting is not hard, it's impossible. There is fundamentally no way that 99.99% of the population could be convinced that any online voting scheme is secure (this includes the vast majority of software engineers). And if voting and vote counting are not understandable to essentially everyone, then you're not living in a democracy.
- CogDisco 6y ago
  Are 99.99% convinced that normal voting is secure?
  - tsimionescu 6y ago
    Yes. And even for those few that are not, the representatives they voted for are, whether they won or lost, so it's all moot anyway (either the representative is correct, or the representative is playing their opponent's game, so it doesn't really matter who won). In general, people don't trust elections because they don't trust their representatives to actually represent their interests, or they don't trust the rest of the political system to actually allow any meaningful change. These are very valid and correct criticisms, confirmed by many sociological studies (in the US at least, the opinions of the bottom 50% of the electorate by wealth have almost no influence on their representatives' agendas). Voter suppression and vote buying/bullying are much more common, but those have little to do with the voting system (though India has an interesting and complex voting system designed to combat a history of systematic retaliation against entire groups of voters, such as de-funding entire regions that had voted the with the losing party). But actual voter fraud is rare in most democracies. It's extremely common in authoritarian regimes that are mascarading as democracies, but an online system would make those cases especially trivial.
quantified 6y ago
Adding screens and tech does not help people to vote, and does make untraceable hacking and distortion much easier. The fact that actual states like Georgia have apparently covered up real examples makes this part crucial. Reliable on-line secret ballots do not exist for us yet and may never. More easy-to-access polling stations does.
- dllthomas 6y ago
  > does make untraceable hacking and distortion much easier IME, high tech voting makes changing one vote a little harder, but it makes changing the outcome much easier.

by hrktb 6y ago

dividuum 6y ago

Totally agree. I’ve voted in every election since I’m 18. So far all voting booths have been in walking distance. IIRC all have been on a Sunday, so it doesn’t conflict with work for most people.

sam_lowry_ 6y ago

If you want more people to vote, then just pass a law that mandates all citizens have to vote. That's how it is done in Belgium. Think of it. If your choice is ether vote or risk a fine, you'd rather go and vote. If you go and vote, you'll learn at least a bit about the choices you have to make in the ballot. P.S. While Belgium got mandatory voting right, it completely messed up electronic voting. I remember being an assessor in a polling station with electronic voting. People voted, then the head of the voting station took 3 1⁄2-inch floppy disks out of the machine, put them in an envelope and drove away to the district polling committee. There was not counting, no protocol to sign. Nothing. I was appalled.

godelski 6y ago
> If your choice is ether vote or risk a fine This is ABSOLUTELY not what I want. I for one want voting to be extremely accessible. Everyone that wants to vote can. The goal isn't to make everyone vote but rather that everyone has the ability to vote. That you don't have to take time off to vote. That it is easy. Universally accessible, not universally mandated.
- madeofpalk 6y ago
  What happens though is that once you make voting compulsory, you have to make voting as easy as possible.
  - true_religion 6y ago
    You could simply mandate that voting be done on a federal holiday. That won't help everyone, but it will help most people who are trying to vote physically.
    - madeofpalk 6y ago
      Australia, which has mandatory voting, also mandates that voting is on a weekend.
      - sam_lowry_ 6y ago
        Same for Belgium. Voting is always on Sunday.
- xeromal 6y ago
  What's wrong with mandated voting?
  - foxrider 6y ago
    People who has no business voting voting. Imagine how many people would vote - not from the informed voter perspective. They'll most likely vote for the candidate they remember in a positive light. Imagine how much more sway would a big ad campaign have. I would be ok if a blank ballot would be the least effort option with no strings attached, but with a "wasting your vote" being a stigma and a part of the culture I see no need in any mandate. I just really don't want people who can't be bothered to go to a polling station on a holiday specifically made for voting to caste their vote to vote at all. Some times gatekeeping certain things is ok. There must be a balance.
rustybelt 6y ago
Yep, and let people vote for a longer period of time. Having a voting week or month instead of a day.
- sam_lowry_ 6y ago
  Nope, spanning voting over several days makes it easy to hack the electoral process. In Belarus, they voted for 5 days and people are out in the streets for 5 weeks to reclaim their votes. Today is the last of three voting days in Rissia, and it looks like the results will be totally made up.

bobthepanda 6y ago

You can do it without the security issues of online though. For example every election in Washington ballots are mailed out to every address on file, it’s very easy to print a ballot online if you didn’t get it in the mail, and until recently there have been no supposed issues with mailing ballots (postage is prepaid), plus there are dedicated dropoff boxes as well. And even with all that convenience turnout was 65% in 2016, though it is expected to be higher this year.

tsimionescu 6y ago

Reliable online voting is not hard, it's impossible. There is fundamentally no way that 99.99% of the population could be convinced that any online voting scheme is secure (this includes the vast majority of software engineers). And if voting and vote counting are not understandable to essentially everyone, then you're not living in a democracy.

CogDisco 6y ago
Are 99.99% convinced that normal voting is secure?
- tsimionescu 6y ago
  Yes. And even for those few that are not, the representatives they voted for are, whether they won or lost, so it's all moot anyway (either the representative is correct, or the representative is playing their opponent's game, so it doesn't really matter who won). In general, people don't trust elections because they don't trust their representatives to actually represent their interests, or they don't trust the rest of the political system to actually allow any meaningful change. These are very valid and correct criticisms, confirmed by many sociological studies (in the US at least, the opinions of the bottom 50% of the electorate by wealth have almost no influence on their representatives' agendas). Voter suppression and vote buying/bullying are much more common, but those have little to do with the voting system (though India has an interesting and complex voting system designed to combat a history of systematic retaliation against entire groups of voters, such as de-funding entire regions that had voted the with the losing party). But actual voter fraud is rare in most democracies. It's extremely common in authoritarian regimes that are mascarading as democracies, but an online system would make those cases especially trivial.

quantified 6y ago

Adding screens and tech does not help people to vote, and does make untraceable hacking and distortion much easier. The fact that actual states like Georgia have apparently covered up real examples makes this part crucial. Reliable on-line secret ballots do not exist for us yet and may never. More easy-to-access polling stations does.

dllthomas 6y ago
> does make untraceable hacking and distortion much easier IME, high tech voting makes changing one vote a little harder, but it makes changing the outcome much easier.