[crote]

Voting the way you really want in primary elections might be counterproductive.

Let's say in the main election 45% of the population will vote for whatever candidate represents side X, 45% of the population will vote for whatever candidate represents side Y, and 10% is more-or-less in the middle.

If, during the primaries, side X votes for a far-X candidate, they will definitely lose the middle 10% to a moderate-Y candidate, leading to a strong Y victory. But if side X votes for a moderate-X candidate during the primaries, the main election will be moderate-X vs moderate-Y, and they have a pretty good chance of securing the slightly-more-than-half of the middle they need for an X victory.

Of course you now end up with a lukewarm moderate X victor who isn't going to represent your far-X views, but at least you're not dealing with an even worse Y-side victor.

The real solution is to get rid of the winner-takes-all system inherently resulting in a two-party election, but Good Luck doing that kind of overhaul!

[Terr_]

Quibble: I think you're conflating "no winner take all" with "less spoiler effect". The first implies the second but not vice-versa.

For example, ranked-choice voting would reduce the spoiler effect, but it would not (on its own) affect that there's a single-winner to each race who "takes all" in the end.