politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
This is exactly the kind of situation the trolley problem was invented to illustrate... and I've never seen anyone fail at it so badly with such a weird take.
You'll allow the greater evil to happen because you don't want to have any part or any responsibility in helping a lesser evil happen. But you do have responsibility, because you do have a choice. In the trolley problem, f you never knew about the lever, you couldn't be asked to pull it or not. In the election problem, if you can't vote you have no responsibility. But the trolley problem states you know about the lever, and in the election scenario, you do have a vote. So you are involved no matter what. And that means you're just as guilty as the person who acted; only your action resulted in more deaths than the person who acted either way. Yours was the worst possible choice.
Try flipping the words from evil to good. The greater evil is worse, and the lesser evil is better. Therefore, you are choosing the worse scenario rather than the better one. It's ridiculously absurd.
If your method of voting is to choose the best person you can imagine, rather than someone who has an actual chance of winning, why vote for any candidate? Why not just write-in vote for Superman? Surely he is less evil than any candidate on the ballot.
Voting is like a game with rules. Sometime you simply can't win. But if you want the best outcome for the game you need to pick the strategy that leads to that outcome. Folding your arms and refusing to change your strategy when your preferred outcome has no chance of success ensures that the people actually playing the game will have it their way. Demanding nothing but the absolute best to earn your vote, and thus not voting for someone with a chance, is statistically identical to supporting the worse evil. It's sheer foolishness.
This kind of purity contest accomplishes nothing but shooting yourself in the foot. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.