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by bee_rider 1161 days ago
Practically it works fine in many areas of the US as well—just, good areas that don’t want to put up hurdles for voters in the first place. But, give an extremism a means to disenfranchise anybody and they’ll go for it

Morally, even if it works out OK, it ought to bug you if you don’t have a cost-free way to vote.
1 comments
mardifoufs 1161 days ago
I don't disagree at all to be honest. I don't think voter fraud is an actual concern (if bare mininum measures are taken, like voter registration or even just "checking in" individuals with their adresses), but I think it's weird that it is considered to be such a huge issue in the US when it is actually the norm in most of the world.

Especially since it's usually white people using POCs as almost "noble savages" who can't figure out how to vote, get an ID, or have a drivers license.

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bee_rider 1160 days ago
I agree and think that some of the “it is just impossible for minorities to get IDs” stuff is, like, uncomfortably low expectations. I think this is sort of condescending and not really helping our case. If you took the average person from a minority community, I happy to believe that they are equally able to get an ID as a person from a majority community.

But in every community there is a range of willingness to deal with bureaucratic annoyances to vote. Adding more hurdles bumps some people from the voter to non-voter bucket. The reason it is a big issue in the US is that we have a well documented history of adding those hurdles selectively in order to suppress votes from particular communities. This is part of a really dark chapter in our history so people have a visceral reaction to it. I mean, since you are Canadian—I guess people would be a little skeptical if someone tried to start a conversation like “Well lots of countries have boarding schools so here’s my plan for education in some underserved communities…,” right?

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