this post was submitted on 09 Jul 2023
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United States | News & Politics

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Neither major candidate got more than 50% of the popular vote even in my very red state. It's not a problem with people going out and voting, the voting public just didn't like either candidate. 2016 was the first election I supported a third party, and it was the first time my parents supported an independent.

Both candidates really sucked. Trump was bad enough that I voted for Biden, despite really not liking Biden. He had almost no chance to win by state, but I still voted for him anyway just to send a message.

We need to fix our electoral system. Instead of voting for the lesser of two evils, I should be able to vote for everyone I am comfortable with. We should adopt either an approval system, range/ranked voting, or some other system other than FPTP. If you want more people to vote, that's how you get it. Make it so people can vote their conscience without feeling like they're throwing their vote away and maybe people will care more.

[–] Spacebar 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Always vote 3rd party or independent at the local level (after researching) because it's the only way to change things over time.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Absolutely. I rarely vote for the majority party candidate, and I'll often rotate between the minority (Dem in my case) and third parties/independents depending on the candidate.

I'm not in a swing state, so I have the benefit of always feeling like I can always vote my conscience instead of picking the lesser of two evils. However, that should ideally be the case everywhere, so we really need voting reform so you can always vote your conscience without worrying about "a vote for X is a vote for Y" nonsense.

[–] capt_wolf 1 points 1 year ago

ALWAYS do your research.

Nothing pisses me off more than a party voter who votes "because they know what's best for me."(quote from my dad, btw.) Unless you own a fortune 500 company, no they fucking don't...