#as a single-issue voter you allow complacency of any of other legitimate issues

[dynamimight]

had to zoom in on this comment

I'm sorry, but I'm just too fucking old to pretend that the presidential ticket of "Person who performed some of the first gay marriages in her state while it was still federally illegal" and "governor who created a trans refuge state while other states were making it illegal to transition" is somehow 'jUsT aS bAd foR QuEer pEopLe' as the ticket promising to reverse marriage equality and make trans healthcare next to impossible.

That is such a monumentally stupid opinion that I'm going to have a hard time believing that you're actually that stupid, and I'll probably just assume you're malicious.

[priceofliberty]

Even if voting isn’t HELPFUL, it at the very least isn’t harmful, and the idea that voting can’t change policy is false-constitutional amendments that are on the ballot can have very big impacts, for example, there’s one in alabama rn that could make it a lot harder to get an abortion. Additionally, the process of voting helps indirectly educate people on the issues and the structure or government, and at the very least encourages people to pay attention to what the govt is doing.

Voting propagates the false notion that your voice matters in a ‘representative democracy’ and that by ticking a few boxes on a ballot, you have exercised the fullest expression of your political authority — this is misleading at best, and outright false at worst; that is what is harmful about the American electoral processes.

If any of you would take a minute out of our day to actually read the study, you’ll see that we’re speaking to national domestic and foreign policies, not local or regional policies. By all means, cast your ballot for propositions and referendums because they represent a rare instance of ‘direct democracy’ against which I am not ideologically opposed (we participate in direct democracy nearly every day in most of the decisions we make).

I also contend that voting does not encourage people to pay attention, as evidenced by the last century of American history. It is pretty clear that once an election ends, peoples’ collective attention span effectively shuts off. In fact, I would argue that the structure of national elections encourages, not stifles, single-issue votes (and thus, single-minded voters). This is further demonstrated by the oscillating intensity of the anti-war movement; very loud during the Bush administration, and very quiet (but still on the fringes) during the Obama administration. Note how many conservatives now support Trump and are quiet about many of his executive overreaches. In sum, voting induces complacency in the base of voters who ‘win’ the election.

Also, the idea that if people don’t vote there will be all this media attention and people will confront the illegitimacy of the system is wrong-elections in Louisiana regularly have turnout under 20%, for example. Most people staying home on election day is the status quo in the South, and nobody cares. It just allows for Republican control of the government, which is meaningfully worse for poor people who have to deal with welfare cuts, or lgbt people who have to deal with job discrimination.

I keep hearing this argument that a lack of voters = a Republican victory, which heavily implies that the majority of people who vote (or would vote) are not Republicans, or would not vote for a Republican; there’s no evidence for this. Republicans parrot the same talking point (that your lack of voting only allows the liberals to win). Still, I know of plenty of Republicans who abstain from voting, and in particular abstained from the 2016 election. It is a falsehood; someone has to be voting for Republicans, who spend just as much money on ‘getting out the vote’ and riling up their base as Democrats do.

I will concede that its merely an idea, simply because its never been seen, that the national media would confront the illegitimacy of an election with unprecedentedly low turnout. I am not sure Louisiana is a good example, despite the historically-frequent low turnout, due to their runoff elections which is something I actually advocate for.

ok yeah i do have one last point on the matter. even if you’re against voting the energy you’re spending urging people not to vote could be much better spent advocating for other things. Like voting doesn’t directly influence policy, true, and it’s not enough, very true! but choosing between two platforms created by elites which nevertheless have very different policies and effects is still an important harm reduction strategy. Also, constitutional amendments and referendums ARE policy. bye lol

And here you concede, unashamed, that you’re putting your lot behind a class of political elites who have better PR than the other class; that voting “doesn’t directly influence policy” (as I continue to assert) but it becomes symbolically important to effect a “harm reduction strategy.” There isn’t a single legitimate argument that a political victory at the polls reduces harm, because the harm is always and consistently pushed off onto other people. In particular, most Americans are content to vote for their candidates, despite the massive, undeniable harm both parties cause to innocent people living anywhere other than America.

Again, my energy is spent urging people to break out of the mentality that the only or best way to reduce harm is to vote. Indeed, voting perpetuates the system of harm, shifting the burden disproportionately onto those deemed undesirable by the political class. Pot calling the kettle black, look where you put your energy this morning. You’re not even trying to convince me, simply lambaste me for what you perceive as wasting time.

You want to help people? Reduce harm? Educate people “on the issues”? Give whatever time or money you can offer to a charity of your choice. There are thousands out there.

That study, by the way, besides stating that “The estimated impact of average citizens’ preferences drops precipitously, to a non-significant, near-zero level”, also concludes:

The failure of theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy is all the more striking because it goes against the likely effects of the limitations of our data. The preferences of ordinary citizens were measured more directly than our other independent variables, yet they are estimated to have the least effect.

Nor do organized interest groups substitute for direct citizen influence, by embodying citizens’ will and ensuring that their wishes prevail in the fashion postulated by theories of Majoritarian Pluralism. Interest groups do have substantial independent impacts on policy, and a few groups (particularly labor unions) represent average citizens’ views reasonably well. But the interest-group system as a whole does not. Overall, net interest-group alignments are not significantly related to the preferences of average citizens. The net alignments of the most influential,business-oriented groups are negatively related to the average citizen’s wishes. So existing interest groups do not serve effectively as transmission belts for the wishes of the populace as a whole.

Furthermore, the preferences of economic elites (as measured by our proxy, the preferences of“affluent”citizens) have far more independent impact upon policy change than the preferences of average citizens do. To be sure, this does not mean that ordinary citizens always lose out; they fairly often get the policies they favor, but only because those policies happen also to be preferred by the economically-elite citizens who wield the actual influence.

In the United States, our findings indicate, the majority does not rule—at least not in the causal sense of actually determining policy outcomes. When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites or with organized interests, they generally lose. Moreover,because of the strong status quo bias built into the U.S. political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favor policy change, they generally do not get it.

It is federal (not state, not local) legislation which determines the ultimate direction this country takes which, in my opinion, is hardly more than a descent into tyranny. It is painfully clear to anyone breathing in the U.S. today that the average citizen has no influence on domestic or foreign policy. It’s clear from this study, as well, that even pooling our resources as average citizens, we have a “non-significant, near-zero” impact on policy. The only preferences that matter are the preferences of the elite—there is no evidence showing otherwise.

This is why I will continue to stress the futility of voting in the national context, and will continue to encourage active participation with charities and activism.