Who is this article for?
It doesn’t address the real problem here: That first past the post voting is a broken system and that main party candidates should make more effort to fix this glaring hole in the voting system.
Because fptp is garbage, third parties are little more than a method to undermine a candidates opposition (in the US in 2024 the green party is ironically propped up in part by the republican party)
By leaving out fptp it just sounds like anti democracy drivel.
I wish we had ranked choice voting, it just makes so much more sense
Yeah, and there are two major parties that don’t really want ranked choice voting. lol
first past the post voting is a broken system and that main party candidates should make more effort to fix this glaring hole in the voting system.
The Democratic Party would rather lose to the Republican Party than change the rules to allow for a multi-party system.
That aside, the major parties don’t want to reform the system they have because it’s worked very well for them. Our parties are incredibly old by world standards. The Democrats have been around since the 18th century, and the Republicans have been around since the 1850s.
The Democratic Party would rather lose to the Republican Party than change the rules to allow for a multi-party system.
Exactly! I wish I could upvote you more than once, friend!
If you think casting any ballot is a form of protest you need to learn what real protest looks like.
Hint: It doesn’t involve participating in the system you’re protesting.
Not voting indirectly also is a vote for Trump.
no, it’s not
Yes, it is
if that were true, you could prove it. there is no world in which non votes are counted for Trump
In the actual world, governed by actual mathematics, you are incorrect. This has been repeatedly pointed out to you, with illustrative examples, by many people. Your stubborn, willful ignorance cannot change the fabric of reality.
Still no proof, friend.
Good point!
For the editor and anyone else who does not understand math: people voting for Trump means Trump gets a vote.
A vote for Jill Stein means Trump does not get a vote.
Would you rather have someone vote third party or vote Trump?
The whole thing feels like an argument intended to push people away rather than rally support.
I’ve noticed a LOT of Lemmy’s seem to want to push people away rather than welcome or rally support when it comes to uncommitted voters or third-party voters… Very surprising to me.
It’s almost like we expect bad faith interactions from people trying to interact with bad faith.
Weird, right?!
I don’t know, because I’m not posting or interacting in bad faith. Just because some doesn’t share your views, doesn’t mean they are interacting in bad faith.
Werid, right?!
Exactly! I’ll share your downvotes…but you’re right.
I don’t get it…why would you even vote for Stein at this point? She’s not going to win, she’s not going to break the threshold for federal election funding, and I don’t see a substantial distinction between her policy and Harris.
Brain worm at least had a 1 in 1000 of breaking the funding threshold. Jill has what, less than a chance of finding the winning lotto ticket in the middle of the desert?
The only result of that vote is boosting Donald’s chances.
Why…why would you even vote for her at this point? What’s the end game?
Harris platform has exactly zero policies in common with the green party
Are you a paid spokesperson for the Green party? I don’t know how you can write something like that with a straight face.
Edit: I went to the green party page to make sure I’m not full of shit…I’m not…it’s a slightly more liberal Democrat policy page.
Same focuses on equality, green energy, and inclusion.
I really don’t get what you think a green party vote will get you that a vote for Harris won’t. Other than another feather in the fedora of stupid mistakes we make when we are young, or you really like Russia. I don’t get it at all.
Because you’re young, clearly. Maybe this is just the first election you’ve paid attention to. Every disaffected voter was like you, once.
Then we realized dem platform has nothing to do, whatsoever, with what the do in office. Even when they have a majority in both houses of Congress and can pass anything their heart desires, they actively refuse to pass legislation relating to the platform they sold us on. You can only be lied to so many times before you realize doing the same thing will not get you a different outcome. Voting dem will never improve your life. Maybe third party will, maybe not, but voting dem won’t, it’s empirically proven.
I’m old enough to remember the green party votes haven’t worked in the last 5 presidential elections. I threw away a vote on them when Obama had a lock on his second term.
Here we are a couple decades later and the green party has done zero to affect major change in the US. They did likely get Hillary fucked, so thanks for that 4 years of hell I guess.
Brain worm was your best chance this cycle and he’s been paid off already.
Really…seriously…what will voting green get you here? You can’t win, you can’t get federal funding, if you break 2% I’ll be amazed…
What’s the point of a green vote when Harris is so closely aligned with your platform?
No child, they didn’t lose clinton the election she refused to campaign for.
And no, a genocidal cop that has only repeated Trump’s 2016 immigration platform has nothing in common with my preferred policies. Greens are he compromise party. The minimally progressive option of things developed countries generally already have.
nothing in common with my preferred policies
Really? And the chick eating dinner with Putin represents you as a person? That’s what you stand for? That’s an interesting statement.
I don’t care who she has dinner with.
Because I don’t care. Neither party actually listens to the average American either way my bills are getting more expensive and my dollar worth less.
Yep! That’s why I’m voting third party. Dems and Repubs don’t care about us.
You really find someone who has promised to herd immigrants into what will certainly become death camps and crash the US economy whilst ending democracy equally bad as business as usual?
I think Harris is just as bad as Trump.
Well I’m definitely not voting Harris or Trump. So I could see how some people would decide on Stein.
So practically speaking, there is no anti-genocide vote. There is no health care for everyone vote. There is no reduction in firearm caused deaths of children and teens vote. There is no anti corporate regulatory capture vote. These things just are not possible to achieve in America by voting.
Ahahaha spoken like a true Nazi watching Jews being boarded on a train.
Edit: I dont know what the hell is going on with this person. I am for damn sure not a nazi.
They’re a troll.
Just wanna point out that calling someone a troll is against the civility rules in this sub. Thank you!
You’re a troll too.
Nope.
Stein refused to call Putin a war criminal, so yes. There is no anti genocide vote.
I wish we’d yell at the non-voters at least as equally as the 3rd party voters.
I wish we’d yell at democrats for failing to appeal to voters, which is really one of the most basic responsibilities of a politician.
Amen!
Me too. It’d take some of the heat off of me for once! haha
Right?!
Comments turned off
The genocidal lib fears the well informed Jill voter.
Truth.
I mean doyee?
No one’s voting 3rd party because they think they’ll win, they’re just throwing away a vote for Harris. Their statement is that they have no issue with another 4 years of Trump because their demands aren’t being met anyway (cough genocide).
You can argue all day about the rationality and lack of utilitarianism, but it won’t change anything.
If MLK were alive, he’d probably vote Democrat because he believes there is a solution in comprise over time, and keeping Republicans out is beneficial to that. (He generally favored the more progressive party).
If Malcolm X were alive, he’d probably be protesting just like the uncommitted group, but choose not to vote if his major demand wasn’t met, because his reasoning would be that any promised or hypothetical solutions would not come to fruition. (The Ballot or the Bullet)
Both have valid reasoning, and it can obviously depend on the situation, but it bugs me that 50 years later people still don’t understand why people choose to vote a certain way.
Both have valid reasoning
I disagree.
Based on your downvotes, looks like more people disagree with you.
But hey, don’t fret, friend. I know what it’s like getting downvoted every comment. Doesn’t bother me. Hopefully it doesn’t bother you. :)
Change won’t come overnight (at least without revolution). Like evolution, it requires constant pressure on the system. Changes that are too radical kill the organism.
A long as people think we can jump from Geoge H.W. Bush to Bernie Sanders in one election it’s going to continue to fail.
Votw Harris this time. Vote for the person slightly more liberal than her next time, etc. It’s a process.
But with the Democratic party, the conversation is ALWAYS “Vote us this time…” or “This election is too important!” They’ve been saying that for 50 years. Nah, friend. Now is the time for me to vote third party. Tired of waiting.
How is throwing your vote into a hole going to help exactly?
I’m voting for someone I believe in and who matches my values. If the duopoly has a problem with that, then they can work harder to welcome me rather than mock me for not voting for them.
So it “helps” because I’m voting for who I want to. As the system should be.
As it should be but not how it is.
But it can be that way if people stop being so scared to stray from the Duopoly.
So your solution is to try harder within the current system, like many others have done for the last 50 years, but this time it will be different! If the problem is with the system, work on changing the system while achieving the best you can until the system has changed. Who you vote for in this election won’t have any impact on the system. This will require a different approach. Vote for who you like, but don’t fool yourself that this will make anyone with power change their stance or plan. Your actions are part of the system working as intended.
Fucking well said. And you have my upvote for mentioning my man, Malcom X. Great post!
Your ‘protest vote’ for Jill Stein is really a vote for Donald Trump
And it always has been.
Sometimes the Green Party protest vote is a vote for George H.W. Bush.
And George W. Bush.
And Donald Trump (the first time).
If the Green Party wasn’t a thing, there would be a lot of elections that the Republicans wouldn’t have won, because the margins were just that thin.
Guess the Democrats would be better served by being more welcoming rather than just calling Green Party voters idiots then.
Not idiots, just woefully misguided to the detriment of others.
And you guys wonder why you all lose voters to third parties. lmao
Because you can’t self reflect?
Don’t confuse your ego with the world outside yourself.
I have no problem with any of that. I’m just not voting for your candidate. Thanks!
In California, it doesn’t matter because the results are already known. In other states the calculus is a bit different.
Online rhetoric sways voters in swing states. Your vote may not change the outcome, but your words might.
Good!
I must have really pissed you off huh?
Not at all.
Let’s break down this bullshit: A vote for Jill Stein is a vote for Jill Stein. The election clerks count ballots marked for Stein and report the vote totals that Stein received. A vote for Jill Stein is literally a vote for Jill Stein.
The statement that a vote for Stein is a vote for Trump is, of course, metaphorical. It’s asserting that a vote for Stein is morally equivalent to a vote for Trump by the speaker’s moral reckoning. It’s a rhetorical shortcut. This shortcut rests on the notion that either the voter would have voted for Harris, or that it is a moral imperative to stop Trump above all else.
That’s a moral judgement call. Other people may judge differently. Flatly stating that a vote for Stein is a vote for Trump so vehemently and absolutely elides any possibility of discourse and clearly tells the Stein voter that the speaker will not listen to or consider any of their views, or reasons to vote for Stein.
Fine, you believe that, but when has telling people more or less directly that you do not have any intention of considering their political beliefs won them over to your side? How is that a good tactic? If it worked, then why not employ it on Trump supporters? Go ahead, tell them that the party you support will ignore what they think and want, and demand they vote for your candidate.
If it doesn’t work on them, why should it work on Stein voters?
Fucking thank you for saying it.
(and for saying it more eloquently than I have been able to.)
Right?! I need to use parts of his post for the endless people yelling at me for voting third party. lol
Nailed it… Probably gonna catch a lot of down votes from lib shills… But fuck 'em, this is exactly right. Honestly, I think any of these bullshit articles that will clearly push people further away must be part of the plan to help Trump… Or are the libs really still just this stupid? Have learned absolutely nothing from all their time losing
I am soooo happy to see how many people are disagreeing with the “a vote for third party is a vote for Trump!” bs that usually so approved here. This discussion thread has made my day! lol
Great post!
Sigh. Sorry deleted by moderator for replying with same thing they said which was I feel necessarily aggressive but it’s understandable.
Anyways;
A vote for Green Party/PSL/etc. is better than the alternative for those voting third party: not voting at all.
Those voting 3rd party will still vote dem down ballot often and will also support dems on amendments and ballot measures.
It is not worth losing the vote across the board, so just chill out and let them vote.
IF the DNC actually wanted those votes it would court those votes. Biggest difference in PSL/Green and DNC is stance in Israel/palestine and some socialist policies. (Well and PSL wants to nationalize the top 100 companies, but that’s probably too much of an ask). Instead of any of that they’ve decided to praise Israel and crack down on immigration. So… sure if you want to court republicans go for it but don’t cry when leftists refuse to vote for you.
Also… people complaining trump supporters don’t vote 3rd party: 80% of third party votes in 2020 were right (libertarian+constitution at 1.22%) 20% were leftist (Green+PSL at 0.31%) so… yeah… 4x more right wing than left wing 3rd party voters.
Edit: updated numbers using 2020 data.
A vote for Green Party/PSL/etc. is better than the alternative for those voting third party: not voting at all.
That’s not the only alternative. There is overlap in the spheres of voters of the green party and democratic party.
IF the DNC actually wanted those votes it would court those votes.
The issue is the spoiler effect which is a result of the overlap.
The spoiler effect is at best a bad hypothesis, and has never been proven to effect actual votes.
People voting third party just would not vote if there was no third party option. This means there is no spoiler.
Yep! I’m one of them who thinks like that.
I love watching remedial game theory being taught every day on multiple instances. What a delight.
Patronizing ex-Redditors vs paid trolls, who will win? The number of Lemmy’s 50k users who are definitely all able to vote in American elections and are unaware enough to be undecided at this point will surely turn this tide.
How much would trolls get paid to freakin’ post on Lemmy?! Think about that for a bit…
LMAO
Jill for president. <3
Bruh, I get downvotes just for posting articles about her. I can only imagine the drama you are gonna get for saying this right now. lol
I’m not voting for her, but I like her. So I support your support of her, friend.
Well… That would depend on how many people vote for a third party, doesn’t it?
I mean, I know Americans love telling other Americans that voting third party is a wasted vote, but that’s a self-fulfilling profacy. If everyone believes nobody is voting third party, then nobody will vote third party, so third parties never win, which will lead Americans to say that nobody votes for third parties.
Your first past the post system and your major news agencies who don’t have the decency to pretend to be impartial is really doing a number on your country.
Edit: Always fun to see how Americans get so offended about being reminded of such a simple fact. All the excuses and the downvotes are great indications of how you’re all doomed to be stuck with what you have.
You are your own worst enemy.
It’s mathematically Impossible to have a 3rd party in the US, when are you people with other systems going to understand that?
It’s mathematically Impossible to have a 3rd party in the US
you’re making that up
Then why do they never win any votes in the electoral college? When is the last time a third party ever succeeded nationally in the US when it didn’t involve the dissolution of some other party that preceded it?
That’s not math. those are just questions.
You’re on a roll today. I just may love you a little bit!
Yep!
