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> people under 25 from voting unless they pass a civics test having seen interviews of trump supporters, I think it would be a good idea to require a civics te

> people under 25 from voting unless they pass a civics test having seen interviews of trump supporters, I think it would be a good idea to require a civics test for everyone. There are way too many people with a tenuous grasp of reality that vote. then again, "qualification tests" have been used historically to silence marginalized voices so its one of those damned either way situations.

6510 3y ago
My version of the test was to have each candidate pick 3 issues and provide their desired solution (where solutions may be vague: negotiate X, investigate X etc) Each voter must be able to pick names of the candidates and which issues they chose in a multiple choice test. (I would also like it if people got some money for passing the test as I suspect the people not voting and the most uninformed voters could really use some money.) The point is simple, if we need you to chose you need to know which choices you have. It is not more but less democratic if you chose randomly.
Terr_ 3y ago
A far-less-dangerous option would be to make it an educational requirement in schools. Focus on increasing the qualifications of the citizenry without making it a hard-requirement to vote. Anecdotally, my school had a 1-semester Specific History Of This State that all freshmen had to take and probably forgot, plus an seemingly-inordinate amount of time spent on the exact dates and locations of Civil War battles. Instead, imagine if some of that time/instruction was set aside for practical civics, including tricks like wrecking amendments [0] or weaknesses of plurality voting like the spoiler effect. [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_amendment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_amendment [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_splitting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_splitting
bradknowles 3y ago
Any civics test will become a Jim Crow test and be abused to strip people of the right to vote who don't have the right color skin, or belong to the right political party, or whatever. I agree that all politicians should need to pass a civics test, but I disagree that it should be a law. Instead, they should be laughed out of the country -- but not as a law.

6510 3y ago

My version of the test was to have each candidate pick 3 issues and provide their desired solution (where solutions may be vague: negotiate X, investigate X etc) Each voter must be able to pick names of the candidates and which issues they chose in a multiple choice test. (I would also like it if people got some money for passing the test as I suspect the people not voting and the most uninformed voters could really use some money.) The point is simple, if we need you to chose you need to know which choices you have. It is not more but less democratic if you chose randomly.

Terr_ 3y ago

A far-less-dangerous option would be to make it an educational requirement in schools. Focus on increasing the qualifications of the citizenry without making it a hard-requirement to vote. Anecdotally, my school had a 1-semester Specific History Of This State that all freshmen had to take and probably forgot, plus an seemingly-inordinate amount of time spent on the exact dates and locations of Civil War battles. Instead, imagine if some of that time/instruction was set aside for practical civics, including tricks like wrecking amendments [0] or weaknesses of plurality voting like the spoiler effect. [1] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_amendment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrecking_amendment [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_splitting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vote_splitting

bradknowles 3y ago

Any civics test will become a Jim Crow test and be abused to strip people of the right to vote who don't have the right color skin, or belong to the right political party, or whatever. I agree that all politicians should need to pass a civics test, but I disagree that it should be a law. Instead, they should be laughed out of the country -- but not as a law.