Merely defacing/voiding/whatever the ballot is not sufficient, IMHO. I want an explicit ‘none of the above’ option, printed clearly on the ballot, and selectable in the same way as any of the other candidates. And I’d want it reported the same way as the other candidates on the news too.
If I were King, potential voters would be required to pass a test on the issues and current events before being allowed to vote. Like many of you, I don’t want people who lack the capability or willingness to be educated about the candidates and issues to be in the voting booth.
Whoever wants to vote should be able to; I don’t think requiring proficiency tests for participating in self-government is really a hot idea, any more than requiring one own property was.
So far, I feel my theory regarding ‘political stunt’ is holding up fairly strongly. Although having all your population voting is regarded as ‘healthier’, it is merely a hollow statistical number which has no real meaning if examined closer.
I am being convinced that compulsory voting was brought in, not because they beleive everyone is smart, but because they assume everyone is stupid.
This is probably the best argument I have seen. However, I am not suggesting that suddenly democracy is perfect. It should be a process of ‘natural selection’. The strong parties will survive. There will be good times and bad times, but perhaps not such predictable ones - or limmited to black, white or grey.
Fairdink… I agree compulsory voting wont help democracy. Now putting politics as survival of the fittest/natural selection is going too far. After all democracy is about representing the people. (I know its the theory mostly). Whilst survival of parties has more to do with funding and cozy arrangements. So if its easier to have several parties/more than 2 parties … in theory its easier for minorities and smaller interest groups to have some kind of political presence… (hopefully not like in israel where the small parties dominate the big ones).
Xerxes, you are my current hero. Coke, Pepsi–neither one even comes close to expressing what I think a government should do. The problems with government are far, far too deeply rooted to be solved with a multiple-choice ballot, when the prerequisite for being taken seriously as a candidate is conforming to the standard party line (line A or line B, which differ about as much as Coke and Pepsi–slightly different flavor; same basic crap).
I do not fail to vote because of apathy or ignorance; I refrain from voting because of my habit of critical thinking. As long as I have the option, I will refuse to allow one unethical, egotistical imbecile to claim my vote as an expression of confidence over another unethical, egotistical imbecile who didn’t get my vote.
If anyone sees this decision as evidence of your superiority, or as evidence that your vote counts more because mine isn’t cast, then enjoy your delusion. You are exactly what the government hopes you will be. Alternatively, you could check out The Irony of Democracy, or a hundred other explanations of the fact that it is the elite class that governs the US, not “the people.” The rulers of the country don’t care enough about you even to dislike you, but if it makes you feel better to support them, feel “free.”
OK. Point taken. But I do think the bigger parties will find it harder to ‘survive’ in an environment where public opinion is not such a reflex action. My beleif is that the smaller parties will slowly lose theire sore neck caused by looking up all the time, and will actually start to look around.
Yep… unfortunately politics is becoming ever more similar to the celebrity business… they yearn for attention and they get it by some pretty devious means sometimes. Its about how you look and sound rather than what your saying…
I have known of only a handful of honest politicians… and we never know how long they will stay that way.
If you force people who don’t have an opinion to vote then your asking them to make a judgement based on style rather than substance.
If someone asks me, in some discussion, why I don’t become a politico and save the wold from oblivion, I basically give them that reason.
exactly… and the media doesn’t exactly help in this department.
yep… but how do we make people vote for substance ? Style still is the eye catcher…
Well I suppose Compulsory voting loses anyway it goes.
There you go you politicos out there. Free us. Free us from this burden of perpetual political impitency, and guide us to eternal hapiness - I.e. sitting on our ass and watching telle all day, not having to get up for sh… (again… joke.)
There is no compulsory voting in Australia.
If you don’t want to vote for anyone, then deliberately spoil your ballot. It will then be discarded by the election scrutineers when the tallies are made.
The laws in Australia are pretty strict in one sense, you will never see a horde of lawyers allowed to grab these spoiled ballots and try to discern the “true intent” of the voter who had totally fouled up his/her ballot, as was successfully done in the US State of Florida in an election for some public office not too long ago.
In Australia, spoiled and disqualified ballots remain disqualified and any group of politicians and lawyers who tried to strongarm the electoral officials into doing something illegal would quickly end up in the cooler and have to explain themselves to a magistrate next day.
If you do happen to fail to get to the polling booth in time, it’s quite easy to avoid the $90 fine. All you have to do is write a letter with a reasonably good story. A car breakdown saga, not too overdone, works every time (well, twice for me over 25 years of voting).
There is another reason why “compulsory” voting is so popular in Australia (and probably other countries). The party faithful don’t have to do very much work on election day other than hand out a few how to vote pamphlets at the polling station, and deliver junk political mail during the previous week etc.
While touring overseas I witnessed an election in the UK a few years ago, helping out a cousin (and host who gave my family free accommodation). He and his friends wore themselves out cajoling the known but lazy party faithful to get out and vote, giving lifts to 80 year olds in their own cars, and otherwise working themselves into the ground on election day just to get some party hack into a highly paid job.
As a freeloading guest I did my bit to help my cousin and the rest of the faithful, loafing only I could get away with it. Watching them running around so madly that day made me realise why “compulsory” voting was so popular with Australian politicians and their helpers.
After all that effort, my cousin wore himself out and crashed out early, so he couldn’t even enjoy the counting “drama” on TV, although he was happy at the outcome the next day for reasons I cannot fathom out. Afte all, he gained nothing for his efforts except some kind of spiritual fulfilment, I suppose.
Then I cannot understand why there seems to be an almost universal rejection by national governments of the ‘none-of-the-above’ option. This makes the intent of the voter exercising that option crystal clear. It may also make it harder for the winners to say that they have a clear mandate from the people. There; I’ve answered my own question 
Where “compulsory” voting does not exist, the option of ‘none of the above’ can easily be exercised by a subject/citizen simply by his/her making no effort to cast a vote at all.
In any case, any view on, “compulsory” voting or “voluntary” voting is a meaningless question. In my view, democratically elected representatives do not represent, and never have represented, the will of the people, any more than a hereditary ruler did.
Since my mid twenties I have thought of any country which describes itself as a “Democracy” or “Constitutional Republic” to be a system of “Elective Dictatorship”.
But what the Hell. That’s just me.
But (perhaps only in my eyes) there’s a huge difference between:
a) I have made a conscious decision not to support any of the proffered candidates / parties, but in order not to be labelled as lazy-as-a-lazy-thing I have put my X against none of the above, and…
b) I’m either too lazy, too disinterested or too stupid to fill out a voting form correctly.
At the moment, you cannot tell how many people fall into (a) vs (b), and there are those for whom that figure would be interesting (well, actually ‘a’ is the interesting figure when compared to how many votes the winner polled. (b) is just a measure of local disillusionment and stupidity).
Perhaps it’s just that I want more ammunition to bring to bear when I hear politicians going on and on about how they have the “mandate of the people”.
BTW, I couldn’t agree more with your “Elective Dictatorship” vs Democracy.
Elective Dictatorship… I like that description.
Alan Owes Bess, it is the ‘health’ of the Democtarship that we are refering to. If compulsory voting (the law - not the decission) is to assert everyones view, then I would like my ‘none-of-the-above’ view heard by the people… and the politicos (I don’t assume all piliticos are human).