3 ms·

Districts are a bad idea, all votes should be based on proportion.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
vlovich123 3y ago
I don’t know. The positive argument for districts is that your representative represents local political needs which isn’t nothing and local needs definitely exist and this is a way of expressing “hey, your federal policies are hurting me locally here”. This does happen I think although it’s unclear how effectively that gets communicated. A big part of the problem is that gerrymandering is only really effective when the House of Representatives stays fixed in size. That’s actually fixable and would significantly reduce the effect size of gerrymandering (and also reduces lobbying power because you need to corrupt a lot more people which gets extremely more expensive). One way to do proportional representation which I think works well is to blend it with districts. All districts get a representative but you add floating seats that are filled in proportionally based on overall vote count. That way you both get local representation in a larger system while largely removing the benefits of gerrymandering because the power balance isn’t determined by the map.
jandrese 3y ago
The problem is when you're talking about representatives it becomes impossible to vote out some bum once he has some seniority with a proportional system. Only the low man on the totem pole is ever really in danger. It means the parties will fossilize around the old codgers. Granted, that's what gerrymandering is intended to accomplish as well, but at least with a district based system you can in theory vote a specific guy out. It also means you have one guy you can turn to if you have a grievance, it's not a big blob of a party for your voice to get lost in.
- HDThoreaun 3y ago
  I asked my house rep about some legislation they supported and they basically told me to fuck off. I'm in a safe district so there is absolutely nothing I can do to oppose them. You get rid of bums in proportional representation by voting for a different party. Individual politicians matter less in that system anyway, so it really just comes down to whether you agree with the party apparatus as a whole.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

I don’t know. The positive argument for districts is that your representative represents local political needs which isn’t nothing and local needs definitely exist and this is a way of expressing “hey, your federal policies are hurting me locally here”. This does happen I think although it’s unclear how effectively that gets communicated. A big part of the problem is that gerrymandering is only really effective when the House of Representatives stays fixed in size. That’s actually fixable and would significantly reduce the effect size of gerrymandering (and also reduces lobbying power because you need to corrupt a lot more people which gets extremely more expensive). One way to do proportional representation which I think works well is to blend it with districts. All districts get a representative but you add floating seats that are filled in proportionally based on overall vote count. That way you both get local representation in a larger system while largely removing the benefits of gerrymandering because the power balance isn’t determined by the map.

jandrese 3y ago

The problem is when you're talking about representatives it becomes impossible to vote out some bum once he has some seniority with a proportional system. Only the low man on the totem pole is ever really in danger. It means the parties will fossilize around the old codgers. Granted, that's what gerrymandering is intended to accomplish as well, but at least with a district based system you can in theory vote a specific guy out. It also means you have one guy you can turn to if you have a grievance, it's not a big blob of a party for your voice to get lost in.

HDThoreaun 3y ago
I asked my house rep about some legislation they supported and they basically told me to fuck off. I'm in a safe district so there is absolutely nothing I can do to oppose them. You get rid of bums in proportional representation by voting for a different party. Individual politicians matter less in that system anyway, so it really just comes down to whether you agree with the party apparatus as a whole.