voting

On another note, John has been lecturing me on the importance of voting (even though I DID vote) because I said that I think everyone has a right to vote or not to vote. He couldn't grasp the idea and we've been going around in circles.

Importance of voting: what a crock. Myths abound. I awoke this morning to some lady from a women's rights organization on the radio screeching, "If you don't vote, you don't have the right to complain, remember," which is one of the most dangerous statements I've ever heard.

Voting a very pathetic and ineffectual expression of one's civic duty. To really enact change you should donate to or volunteer for lobbying organizations. Today on NPR they were saying that the governor of PN has given expatriates an extra 8 days to get their ballots in - how much more obvious does it have to be that those ballots will have little, if any, sway on the outcome?

It's the system that's the problem, not the person in office. The incentive structure of government offices is to increase encroachment into our personal lives, no matter how well-intentioned the politician is. The size of gov't has increased each year since the office was created, even under Reagan. And you can't vote out a system.

Even if voting were meaningful, usually the options are ridiculous. As the boys from Southpark say, it's basically like choosing between a Giant Douche and a Turd Sandwich. I refuse to add to the legitimacy of a candidate whose policies are antithetical to the majority of the ideals I hold. I refuse to put support, no matter how ineffectual, behind someone I think will do a bad job. I can't think of anyone running this year I would put support behind.

I do believe in voting in some ways, though. It increases an electorate's awareness about issues, which is important to some degree. However, its negatives may outweigh its benefits. Again, you're giving legitimacy to someone who you don't always agree with, and they'll take that "vote of confidence" and run, thinking they have the backing of "the people." What voting has done to our conception of government is also bad in some ways. As Hayek warned in the Constitution of Liberty, only under democracies did people begin to think it was unnecessary to limit the government's reach into our economic and personal lives. To me, that's a bad, bad, thing.

Labels: political, social