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If everyone thought, as you assert, that an individual vote does not matter, then they would not vote; therefore both the quantitative and qualitative meaning/v

If everyone thought, as you assert, that an individual vote does not matter, then they would not vote; therefore both the quantitative and qualitative meaning/value of the "votes" (plural) would change too. They are inextricably bound; you are just viewing things through a statistical lens but that is not the only one that is valid. Grow up. Your attitude is poison and if more people thought like you we would have lost democracy long ago. Furthermore the act you describe of taking the time to vote based on the issues, even when a particular candidate or proposition goes against the voter's normal worldivew, is not irrational, it is doing one's civic duty to be informed. The vote is the inflecion point at which that civic duty materializes most clearly; but it is part of a larger, always-ongoin process in which the citizens and the state are in a dialogue with each other; and the citizens are in dialgue with other citizens. If there were no impetus to vote, then the dialogue itself becomes somewhat irrelevant; therefore the voting is what anchors the abastract to the concrete world of here-and-now. Your again, extremely small-minded, view of the world can not account for this.

lapcat 2y ago
> If everyone thought, as you assert, that an individual vote does not matter, then they would not vote I just said, immediately before your reply, "I didn't say there was no reason to vote", and this is your response? Nice reading comprehension. > it is doing one's civic duty That's exactly what I was referring to in my original post: "Voting tends to be more of a symbolic or ethical act than an rational act". > Your attitude is poison > extremely small-minded Please read and respect the HN guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > if more people thought like you we would have lost democracy long ago The United States has always been a plutocracy, and the plutocrats who wrote the Constitution were explicitly suspicious of direct democracy, intentionally adding a number of measures to obstruct it. The most recent election was largely a contest between competing factions of billionaires, and guess what, a billionaire won. It's actually so-called "strategic" voting, choosing the lesser of two evils, that perpetuates the evils of our plutocracy.
- syncmaster913n 2y ago
  "Voting tends to be more of a symbolic or ethical act than an rational act" An act that is consistent within one's ethical framework is a rational act. Agree or disagree, and why? Thanks.

lapcat 2y ago

> If everyone thought, as you assert, that an individual vote does not matter, then they would not vote I just said, immediately before your reply, "I didn't say there was no reason to vote", and this is your response? Nice reading comprehension. > it is doing one's civic duty That's exactly what I was referring to in my original post: "Voting tends to be more of a symbolic or ethical act than an rational act". > Your attitude is poison > extremely small-minded Please read and respect the HN guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html > if more people thought like you we would have lost democracy long ago The United States has always been a plutocracy, and the plutocrats who wrote the Constitution were explicitly suspicious of direct democracy, intentionally adding a number of measures to obstruct it. The most recent election was largely a contest between competing factions of billionaires, and guess what, a billionaire won. It's actually so-called "strategic" voting, choosing the lesser of two evils, that perpetuates the evils of our plutocracy.

syncmaster913n 2y ago
"Voting tends to be more of a symbolic or ethical act than an rational act" An act that is consistent within one's ethical framework is a rational act. Agree or disagree, and why? Thanks.