I've been seeing a lot of anti-voting sentiment going around. Can't believe I have to say this, but you need to vote. Not only is there more to the election than just the president. (State policy, Senate, house), but not voting is not an act of protest. C'mon guys

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[–] guriinii@lemmy.world 15 points 9 months ago (4 children)

In the UK you can spoil your ballot if you're unhappy with the options and is a recorded vote. Perhaps there's something like that.

[–] AnyOldName3@lemmy.world 28 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's not a good tool if one party is likely, but not guaranteed, to win without your vote, but is much worse than the other. You should only spoil your ballot if your constituency is has a large enough majority that your vote won't matter at all, or none of the parties are less bad than the others.

If you're voting on the single issue of Palestine in the US presidential elections (not the primaries), then no state has a large enough majority to justify as spoiled ballots, and one party wants to support a genocide while the other wants to discourage it (even if they're doing a crap job of it), so there is a least bad option to vote for.

[–] daltotron@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

It’s not a good tool if one party is likely, but not guaranteed, to win without your vote, but is much worse than the other. You should only spoil your ballot if your constituency is has a large enough majority that your vote won’t matter at all, or none of the parties are less bad than the others.

The first instance is realistically the only case in which it would really matter that you spoiled your ballot, though. In the second example of when you might spoil your vote, it wouldn't really matter at all, precisely because they have a large enough majority.

[–] Crashumbc@lemmy.world 14 points 9 months ago

Except we have an actual self proclaimed dictator, trying to gain power. These fucking "progressives" are helping him.

As someone with a modicum of common sense, it boggles my mind that these spoiled children think helping Trump seize power is a good idea for anyone including themselves.

[–] lordmauve@programming.dev 7 points 9 months ago

I don't understand the motivation to spoil your vote. First past the post is the shittiest voting system but the rational response is to vote tactically instead, perhaps reduce the majority of your disliked incumbent. Even if you can't overturn a majority, MPs on smaller majorities may be less arrogant, and less likely to vote for unpopular policies. But sometimes you do overturn a majority. It will happen lots in this/next year's election.

I don't think any politician gives a shit about the numbers of spoiled ballots, they literally don't look even once at those numbers.

[–] roguetrick@lemmy.world 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

I live in maryland so my ballot doesn't matter much regardless for the presidential election. If Biden loses maryland he loses. And I won't be voting for him. The worst thing missing my vote will do for him is reducing his popular vote. Since that's mostly a talking point, good.