Just thought I’d share this article detailing the opinions of Matt Stone, our second-favorite South Park creator.
I’m still not sure if I agree with him or not. Lots of ways to go with this one.
I agree with him. I’m probably one of the few people who will admit to being morally opposed to ‘get out the vote’ type drives. It just seems counterproductive. If people don’t bother to register to vote, which is easy, they are not going to bother to actually get informed on the issue, which is much harder. Why should we try to get the uniformed to vote, it just dilutes the power of informed people, and leads to bad government.
Hey, I wear a uniform. Why shouldn’t I vote, too?
I absolutely agree. Would you allow a historian to replace your transmission? If one doesn’t know what they’re doing, they sure as hell shouldn’t be contributing to the fate of this country.
Just remember, we’re talking about guys who think a singing Christmas poo is the height of comedy.
Because they don’t need no stinkin’ Badges.
Just kidding. I wear a uniform, too. My badge has a naked running white guy on it. Seriously.
You know, at this point I can’t really see any flaw in this argument. If that’s all that Stone said then why is Sean Penn so pissed off?
One could argue that even stupid people have a right to have a say in how their lives are affected. I mean, stupid or not, how would you feel if someone told you that they knew better what was good for you, and to just sit down, shut up, and take whatever they decided?
I said one COULD argue this, but I won’t, since this isn’t Great Debates. 
Well then, while we’re at it. If you’re going to vote for someone because you saw his name on 5,428 signs you drive past on your daily commute, STAY HOME!
Name recognition is NOT a good reason to elect some dork who has pretty signs!
It’s a moot point seeing as I can’t vote anyway, but personally I do not like that line of thought at all. For one thing, people are always “informed” in that they happen to live in the society that’s formed (for a good part) by their elected representatives.
As for the informed/uninformed bit, by adding new voters to the pool, there’s at least a chance that some will inform themselves. (If not before voting, then the frst time someone used their vote to do something they disagreed with. Nothing like feeling screwed over to get people to take a good long look at their candidates and options.)
Heck, bring’m out. Have some faith in the Great Experiment. The random votes will hopefully cancel out.
I used to feel very strongly that every uninformed vote cancels out an informed vote. But really, when you think about it, there will be just about as many uninformed people voting for Option A as there will be voting for Option B. The uninformed votes will cancel each other out and not do any serious harm.
I’ve come to an opinion mych like Spiny Norman’s:
bolding mine
When I first started voting I was quite uninformed, but my participation inspired me to take more of an interest. After voting I pay much closer attention to what the elected officials are doing, or what may have been the effect of a certain ballot measure- thus, when the next election comes around I am more informed than I would have been had I not voted in the previous election. With each election I become a more and more responsible voter.
It is also often the case that people do have well formed opinions on candidates and issues but don’t believe that their vote makes a difference (a feeling that is strengthened by impeachments, candidates winning the popular vote but losing the election*, and -in my State- a gubernatorial recall). I do think it is a good idea to encourage these people to vote.
*I do support the Electoral College, but the 2000 Election was very frustrating for people who didn’t understand it.
Sean Penn is hiding in the corner with a gun pointed at my head, if I make one false move he’ll kill me- I swear! Please send help! Send help!
By becoming 18 they are added to the voting pool. I’m not advocating Jim Crow on the non-political, but standing on the sidewalk trying to guilt people into voting is anti-democratic. You simply take the extra 30 seconds while getting your driver’s license to register. If you don’t feel like getting registered, then you arn’t likely to provide the dedication to listening that a real voter deserves. If someone chooses to vote while being stupid, then I have no problem with that, let them register and vote, it’s no big deal. But to ambush people outside the grocery store, then browbeat them into voting is not a good step toward a good govenrment.
The set of people that will become informed is, in my opinion, superceded by the set of people who will decide to vote on their own.
Isn’t Penn always pissed off about something?
You are so going to get a letter. :eek:
And is it even working? Sure, you’re registering more voters, but are they turning up to vote? They still have to take that arduous 15 minutes out of their day in November to get themselves to a polling place and vote. Could the “get out the vote” drives be part of why the percentage of registered voters who vote each year is so small? (I dunno, I’m asking, not WAGging.)
I like the convenience of voter’s registration everywhere, because I’ve moved a lot in the last six years, and I can update my address with these folks. I’ll never remember to do it on my own, but when I’m reminded by the yahoo blocking the apples at the grocery store, I’ll take care of it. Of course, now I can do it online, so it’s even easier. Aaah, the power of never speaking to a human being…
Many people who regularly vote don’t know squat about the issues, either, so “get the out the vote” drives are no worse than the status quo. CNN ran this article about groups of television viewers and their scores on a short, easy political quiz. Daily Show viewers scored 60% on average, Letterman and Leno viewers just under 50%, and network news and newspaper viewers scored lower than chance! The quiz is so easy that no one should have scored less than 5/6, but there you go.
After reading that, for a moment I though it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have voters read a short pamphlet describing the candidates’ platforms before voting, but that amounts to a literacy test, which has been ruled illegal.
Apparently most of Tennessee is too stupid to vote.
As for getting to the polls, I just found out yesterday that all you damn yankees don’t get any time off to vote, unlike the civilized nation I come from where it’s the law to have a 4-hour block off work while the polls are open.
In California employers are required to give voters two hours PTO to vote, if the employee needs it. Since the polls are open until 8:00, I never needed to take that time even though I lived in L.A. and worked in Orange. Instead, I’d vote on the way to work. I’d leave the flat at 7 ayem and go to the polling place, cast my vote, and then go to work. I’d be 15-30 minute late getting in, but I had avoided the rush and the long lines.
And yes, I wore my “I voted” sticker to remind people at work to vote.
“Get out the vote” drives are not concerned with people who simply have no idea who they should vote for and don’t care to learn. They are concerned with groups (based on age, sex, race, class, geographical area, etc.) who are traditionally underrepresented among voters because they’ve been conditioned into believing that voting is pointless and learning about politics is pointless. These are not, as a rule, stupid people. On the contrary, often the people who are most likely to vote and who believe that they are smarter and more well-informed than other people are in fact not very bright and not at all well-informed about the issues.
The point is to tell the groups that are traditionally underrepresented that their vote is important. They should start learning about the issues and about the candidates. At that point, when they understand them, they should vote. There are politicians who are kept in office, despite their unpopularity among large segments of their constituents, because smaller proportions of those groups vote. To tell these groups that they should vote is not to encourage stupid people to vote but to persuade discouraged groups that they can have an effect on politics, so they should learn about the issues and then vote on them.
Maybe we’re talking about different things. The people who sit at the folding table at my local Dominick’s have no information on any candidate, nor do they tell anyone where to find such information. They just have a stack of registration forms and help people fill them out. Their only questions are “Are you registered to vote? Do you have an ID on you with your current address?”