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PaperclipPerfector  7mo ago (text post)   32676 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 16, 2024

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I'm currently having a debate with my dad.He asserts that voting is a civic duty, and that if you don't vote you can't complain about outcomes.

I disagree with both halves:

  • voting is commendable, but supererogatory, and in practice futile compared to lobbying and coalition-building

    • If it's a duty, why don't they arrest you for not following through? Failure to comply with taxes and selective service both get people very angry.
    • If it's a duty, why is it made practically harder than the intrinsic difficulty of developing an informed opinion? There is no Voting Day or Weekend, there is no guarantee of no reprisal for taking time off to do it.
      • Tangential rant: why the fuck is the most powerful country on the planet apparently incapable of deploying world-class secured online voting? Why is the single fundamental operation of ensuring political legitimacy treated so unseriously? You have to show up in person? And you're authenticated by showing a $15 license-like thing at best? Scribbling on a register? Scribbling on a mailed-in slip?
    • If I'm honest with myself there's an element of go-to-hell rebellion. Duty is meaningless if you didn't sign up for it with full comprehension, and you can take your cultural-indoctrination-by-bullying and shove it. I'd happily trade my federal suffrage for my federal tax burden.
    • An individual vote isn't much power at all. In an age where a junior senator can be bought for $10K, you properly 'vote' by organizing a Fun Run and starting a war chest, or finding a way to enhance or steer an existing one. Voting by voting is a loser's game.

  • it's obviously viable to hold an opinion on how a leader you didn't vote for is acting. Flippantly, it's like atheism: you didn't vote for every other pol, why is the one in power different somehow? Practically, we don't say you can't hold an opinion about your driver falling asleep if you're a passenger.

    • Less flippantly, if no leaders on offer will implement policies or styles/frameworks that you'd prefer, then participation at all indicates a mandate, and refusing participation expresses protest. Especially in the US federal system, where there is no "none of the above" option.
      • He assures me that spoiling your vote in protest implements this, so long as you Do the Voting Ritual. I don't trust the opaque interpretation of unknown officials, and these days don't trust that it won't be used in some vote hack.
    • You don't vote for high leadership's direct actions, you can't predict what decisions they'll take for reference situations, there is no standard expression of personal style. You're already an ignorant passive passenger once the vote is cast, why is intelligently and deliberately refusing to vote somehow special?

There's mutual incomprehension, here, and frankly he doesn't seem sophisticated in his thinking; it's just repeating a slogan with the vehemence of a moral axiom, pure meme replication, pure social force on force. Can someone steelman his side for me? Mind read if you need to. Can someone steelman my side for me?

The way it works is people will claim

  1. If you don't vote, you've implicitly accepted the majority decision and can't complain about outcomes.

  2. If you do vote, and lose, then by voting you've accepted the legitimacy of the system and can't complain about outcomes.

I’ve never seen 2 in real life in my entire life.

I’ve never seen 2 in real life in my entire life.

I, for one, have encountered this view in personal discussions, from multiple people.

That’s wild. So they’re not fans of criticizing sitting presidents or something? I guess I did have an ex-air force friend at one time who wouldn’t criticize the sitting president, but didn’t mind if I did.

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