3 ms·

Then the obvious solution is to do what a civilised country does: schedule the election on a Saturday and make it compulsory and easy to do. Other countries ha

Then the obvious solution is to do what a civilised country does: schedule the election on a Saturday and make it compulsory and easy to do. Other countries have phones and all the other excuses. We just don't have a system that's deliberately designed to suppress voting.

WeylandYutani 3y ago
In the US you have to register to vote. That creates friction. In my country they send every adult citizen a ballot.
- jjtheblunt 3y ago
  In the US some people lose (by law) the right to vote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disfranchisement#Based_on_criminal_conviction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disfranchisement#Based_on_crim...
  - deprecative 3y ago
    And in some states (Florida) felons had their ability to vote restored but the legislature made it so that you have to pay your fees, fines, etc., before your sentence is considered served. They don't have a central place by which to check if you are paid up. The result? New crimes and bye bye voting.
- ttt3ts 3y ago
  Which country?
hindsightbias 3y ago
Other countries have compulsory voting in primaries?
- naruhodo 3y ago
  Well, no. The flaw in my comment. But my main intent was to speak to the broken nature of American "democracy", as it is called. In Australia, we don't elect a president, so we don't have primaries. The head of state - the Governor General - is almost never involved in the process. Instead, the leader of the party that has a parliamentary majority (and therefore forms government) becomes the Prime Minister. And the party leader is selected in whatever arcane manner the party desires. People vote for party representatives or independents at the level of their local electorate. The prime minister (Australia) doesn't get to override the parliament by decree. And since the house of representatives and senate are functional, decrees are unnecessary. What we don't have is: * Gerrymandering. Electoral boundaries are drawn fairly by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC). * Rules that take away people's right to vote. Our voter participation rates are about 90%[1] in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. If you don't have an opinion, you show up at the polling booths, get your name ticked off, draw a nice big cock on the ballot papers and drop them in the box, or just walk out. * Endless filibustering. We do have Double Dissolution[2] (the nuclear option) where both the House and the Senate are dissolved (if only there was a big vat of acid!) and everyone goes back to the polls. It's very rarely used, but occasionally threatened. * First-past-the-post voting: we use a ranked-choice system called preferential voting, where if your first choice doesn't get a majority, your vote transfers to your second choice etc.[3] That means we do not have a two party system and you can not waste your vote by voting for someone other than the big two. * Other American shitfuckery that I can't think of right now. But we do have some American-style donation shitfuckery that I wish we could fix. Money has disproportionate say in our political system, though it is far less broken than American politics. [1] https://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/federal_elections/voter-turnout.htm https://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/federal_elections/voter-tur... [2] https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/having-your-say/elections-and-voting/double-dissolution/ https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/having-your-say... [3] https://www.chickennation.com/voting/ https://www.chickennation.com/voting/

WeylandYutani 3y ago

In the US you have to register to vote. That creates friction. In my country they send every adult citizen a ballot.

jjtheblunt 3y ago
In the US some people lose (by law) the right to vote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disfranchisement#Based_on_criminal_conviction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disfranchisement#Based_on_crim...
- deprecative 3y ago
  And in some states (Florida) felons had their ability to vote restored but the legislature made it so that you have to pay your fees, fines, etc., before your sentence is considered served. They don't have a central place by which to check if you are paid up. The result? New crimes and bye bye voting.
ttt3ts 3y ago
Which country?

hindsightbias 3y ago

Other countries have compulsory voting in primaries?

naruhodo 3y ago
Well, no. The flaw in my comment. But my main intent was to speak to the broken nature of American "democracy", as it is called. In Australia, we don't elect a president, so we don't have primaries. The head of state - the Governor General - is almost never involved in the process. Instead, the leader of the party that has a parliamentary majority (and therefore forms government) becomes the Prime Minister. And the party leader is selected in whatever arcane manner the party desires. People vote for party representatives or independents at the level of their local electorate. The prime minister (Australia) doesn't get to override the parliament by decree. And since the house of representatives and senate are functional, decrees are unnecessary. What we don't have is: * Gerrymandering. Electoral boundaries are drawn fairly by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC). * Rules that take away people's right to vote. Our voter participation rates are about 90%[1] in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. If you don't have an opinion, you show up at the polling booths, get your name ticked off, draw a nice big cock on the ballot papers and drop them in the box, or just walk out. * Endless filibustering. We do have Double Dissolution[2] (the nuclear option) where both the House and the Senate are dissolved (if only there was a big vat of acid!) and everyone goes back to the polls. It's very rarely used, but occasionally threatened. * First-past-the-post voting: we use a ranked-choice system called preferential voting, where if your first choice doesn't get a majority, your vote transfers to your second choice etc.[3] That means we do not have a two party system and you can not waste your vote by voting for someone other than the big two. * Other American shitfuckery that I can't think of right now. But we do have some American-style donation shitfuckery that I wish we could fix. Money has disproportionate say in our political system, though it is far less broken than American politics. [1] https://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/federal_elections/voter-turnout.htm https://www.aec.gov.au/Elections/federal_elections/voter-tur... [2] https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/having-your-say/elections-and-voting/double-dissolution/ https://peo.gov.au/understand-our-parliament/having-your-say... [3] https://www.chickennation.com/voting/ https://www.chickennation.com/voting/