This attitude is toxic and worse, incorrect. The majority of Americans did not vote for our President. I live in Austin, and my state district in TX includes a tiny slice of a city hundreds of miles away, Houston. Many state districts are like this, gerrymandered to prevent my vote from counting. Some places have it worse, DC, the capital, has no representation at all (fun trivia: Google the DC license plate).
The voters didn't ask nor vote for our government. The government picked the voters...
The 50% of people who didn’t vote in the last election are equally responsible for the current President as those who did (and every president prior, too).
I agree wholeheartedly that a democratic government reflects its voters. A largely apathetic, non-voting populace exaggerates the effect of gerrymandering, campaign finance and media manipulation.
Also due to the electoral college and the winner-take-all way in which voting is designed in the U.S, your vote for president only matters if you live in a swing state. If you live in California or New York, there's basically no point in voting for president because there's such a large Democratic majority and it's winner-take-all.
I am well aware, but that has nothing to do with the almost half of eligible voters who didn't vote at all. Californians who didn't vote in 2016 (~9m) far outnumber Hillary's margin over Trump (~4.3m). There's only "no point voting for president in California" because 9m Californians don't vote. That's nothing to do with "the system", that's a choice that every single one of those 9m voters is making.
Which brings me back to my original point, which is that voter apathy exacerbates the influence of gerrymandering and campaign spending in winning elections.
> If you live in California or New York, there's basically no point in voting for president because there's such a large Democratic majority and it's winner-take-all.
Winner-take-all in any state that leans predominantly in one direction means that your vote doesn't matter. Unless those 9 million people happened to all be of the Republican party (extremely unlikely), it wouldn't have made any difference had they voted or not. Winner-take-all means all the delegates go to the winner.
It has everything to do with the system. Instead of just preaching that people should vote, maybe take a look at why they aren't. Maybe some don't because they can't get off work and unlike many other countries, election day isn't a national holiday. Or maybe because they don't feel like it makes a difference. If you don't live in a swing state, then one is right to feel like their presidential vote doesn't make a difference because as I just explained, it doesn't, and it shouldn't be that way.
> Unless those 9 million people happened to all be of the Republican party (extremely unlikely), it wouldn't have made any difference had they voted or not.
Perhaps if more people voted in places like CA, the discrepancy between the popular vote and the actual winning candidate would be shown to be so absurd that we could actually get a movement going to successfully change how we elect our leaders.
Then again, it's possible (likely?) that would be matched by more people in red states voting such that the margins would end up the same.
As someone in predominantly blue state, I make a point to vote 3rd party. 15% of the popular votes means they get to be in the debates. At least it's something....
What makes you think non-voters would vote much differently than voters? To me it seems like voting is something like a survey, and we have about fifty percent of the population responding. If all non-voters voted, I'd expect roughly equal electoral results.
Of course, you might mean that you just want the half of non-voters who agree with you to vote, but that's a different thing.
As a DC resident, it does feel really frustrating, at a time when the nation's politics feel especially important, to not even have a representative to speak with/pressure. Especially when the chief argument against DC statehood has been that it'll tip the Senate to the left. BS.
You miss the applicability of the saying because you drastically overestimate the capability of the average American.
Hell, ignoring the deplorable level to which standards have been lowered by perverse incentives to pass students, the US only has an average of 80 HS graduation rate.
These are your voters. People who struggled to make it through high school have just as much of a day over your governments, your legislation, as you do. Do you expect uneducated and/or ignorant voters to make good decisions?
You can rise up and fix the system and get the leader you deserve, or you can complain about and do nothing else, and in that case you'll end up with the leader you deserve.
This is more of the same sanctimonious toxicity. You don't know me. I already donate to act blue. I already go to political rally's. I already help get friends to go vote. I already am a member of local political groups. I am still not represented. No state or federal ballot I have ever cast has counted.
Please don't tell people that they would ever deserve our current leaders. People deserve safety, stability, and basic decency, no matter what. Even if they make a mistake. Especially then. People deserve better.
Disclaimer that I use similar remarks to the quote you disagree with. This is with the understanding that the price that needs to be paid will literally take lives at times, and that there is little to no fairness at who bears that cost.
That being said, you seem to be quite active politically and doing more than most in this arena. At what point do you give up and move to where you think you'll be represented? This is assuming you have the means to go elsewhere. Some people operate on moving to where they are treated best, that includes the option of a different country.
> Disclaimer that I use similar remarks to the quote you disagree with. This is with the understanding that the price that needs to be paid will literally take lives at times
I guess it's easy to make those kinds of remarks when you know you won't be the one paying that price, huh?
You're right that nobody is blameless. But we can't abandon everyone to destructive whims of the minority. In the US only about 23% of the possible voting public won the last presidential election.
It's not just voting. I'm to blame for inaction and not running for office. As an engineer I could have something credible to say about many pressing issues. By why would I ever enter a race that is decided not on any values I uphold, but by manipulating the under-educated. Somehow the message did not win many races: "Vote for a scientist or an engineer or you may die from the next catastrophe that nobody believed us when we said we should prepare for it."
The voters didn't ask nor vote for our government. The government picked the voters...