Really no comments as an American but my general impression is that it’s a culturally significant natural resource that’s been poisoned by industrialization.
All the people saying mandatory voting is bad are misinformed. It is essential for democracy, and should be applied everywhere.
Australia has mandatory voter turnout, but you do not need to submit a vote. You just need to show up on polling day.
Everyone has political interests and needs to be politically represented, but some people are too tired after work to take themselves to the polling centre. Others are incarcerated. If anything, those people are more in need of political representatives.
American conservatives spend billions trying to prevent poor overworked people from reaching polling places or exercising their right to vote. Mandatory voting prevents that.
Make no mistake, Australian democracy is healtheir than whatever clusterfuck in going on in the US.
Whether mandatory voting is bad or not, certainly it’s way better than the American situation, where one particular party’s strategy to win elections is to discourage and actively prevent people from voting. In Australia, every political party seeks to win by collecting votes.
Not only that, but Australia’s actual ballot is leagues better, too. Ranked ballots are a great way to weaken (unfortunately not eliminate) the two party system, which is unfortunately also the reason the United States will never see anything like it. (At least not in the foreseeable future.)
If a person is too tired to vote that means resting is more important to them than voting. Forcing that person to vote is invalidating their own prioritization.
Are you talking about feeling too tired to spend 20 minutes voting 3 times every 4 years or cutting out your own heart to give to someone?
Cause in the the latter case I agree and in the former I say buck up mate, we live in a society and that means doing stuff for people when we don’t always feel like it.
So firstly that is a non sequitur. Either we are talking about whether the sacrifice demanded is unethically steep or we are talking whether the initiative is ineffective.
Lets put that aside though, just making a note this is a separate point to explore.
I would first ask what you mean by voting quality. Could you explain?
They mean some people shouldn’t vote because their opinion is low quality and should be ignored. It’s an anti democratic belief that the stupid/misinformed shouldn’t vote.
Do you really stand behind that asinine statement or did you just whip yourself in to a frenzy and after thinking logically about it you now want retract it?
“Should be mandatory everywhere” ima stop you right there, I couldn’t give a single flying fuck about politics so having to vote results in me showing up not caring because I don’t want a fine and I’ll vote for a random candidate which will result in just picking a name out of a hat if an entire country did it
You don’t have to vote in Australia. You just have to show up so it proves you were able to vote without impediment if you so choose to. You could draw a penis on it if you even could be bothered.
Voting typically takes place over a weekend in Australia and you have plenty of time to do it. You can also postal vote or absentee vote in advance fairly easily if you wish too. Polling places are literally like every school so there’s always one nearby too.
Spoiling your ballot is an established and documented form of political protest. Nothing says “fuck all these chumps” like drawing a big cock and balls on the ballot.
Politics is part of everyday life regardless of whether you care or not and I’m not talking about the media circus that is the US election machine but rather about the cost of products and services, prevention of crime and what is determined as a crime, the rules of how to conduct business, provision of services like roads, water, sewage by government/authorities and the rates of taxes that fund those services to make but a few. If you don’t care about politics them I would imagine you have no opinions on anything of that nature and would never complain of your cost of living increased or you couldn’t access medical treatment or call a fire station in a time of need or about who had the right to vote?
Making voting mandatory in Australia also protects people who want to vote from being exploited by their employers. Imagine the scenario where there is a referendum on a matter that would be very beneficial to businesses but exploits employees. A corrupt business may decide to schedule their employees to work a 12 hour shift that would prevent them from being able to vote if the business knew it’s employees would vote against the legislation when they want it to pass.
You don’t actually have to cast your vote in Australia, just show up but even if it was mandatory to cast it, they can always be spoiled. You could even write “I have no opinion on politics and don’t want to vote for anyone”.
Willful ignorance, stupidity, and a shitty attitude - you really should educate yourself. Genuinely. It’ll save you a lot of embarassment and you can’t start to contribute to society instead of being part of the problems that hold it back.
Here’s your next free lesson - You should have written “Too long, didn’t read…”
I don’t pay too much attention to Australian politics, but whenever I see headlines it’s always something like “MP literally destroying the barrier reef with his own bare hands” or “Corruption whistleblower sentenced to one thousand years in jail”
Things like “MP approves funding for new hospital” don’t make headlines. Even moreso for any world headlines to rise above the din of American politics it usually has to be something pretty outrageous.
The important thing to note is: Australia has a genuinely solid chance of removing the right-wing nutjobs / spineless centrist two-party system BECAUSE of mandatory voting. Young people in USA have appalling voter turn out. But young people in Australia are seriously turning the tides. See the results by age group for the 2019 election. The boomers are still voting in right-wing nutjobs (Liberal party), most groups have strong centrist representation (Labor), and Gen Z are bringing in a third, non-major, left-aligned party (Greens). It brings so much hope for younger generations and the fact that voting doesn’t feel futile. https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/f56abdd2-7ce6-45a7-8bad-23e945ea6bd9.jpeg
Australia has mandatory voter turnout, but you do not need to submit a vote. You just need to show up on polling day.
So just to clear up a technical misconception here - the wording in the Electoral Act is quite clear. All enrolled electors are legally required to vote. It’s only a consequence of the secret ballot that makes this provision unenforceable, so someone can turn up and get their name marked off while not submitting a vote without facing any consequences, but it is technically an illegal act.
If the AEC were to come up with some way to determine that you didn’t vote without betraying that secret ballot, they would be within their rights to issue a you a fine.
When you go to vote they check you off on either a physical or digital list - so they can work out who didn’t vote. What they can’t work out is whether you submitted a legit ballot
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Oh No! Ross and Carrie: Two skeptics investigate claims of the paranormal–they show up so you don’t have to. Fantastic investigative journalism.
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There’s low level constant pain that’s not easily comparable to anything else, which gets worse the day after any adjustments are done. And make sure you get a retainer you can wear each night.
My mistake was not asking for an alternative retainer, and grinding teeth at night kept breaking my retainers until it got too expensive to keep getting new ones. Now I’ll have to get braces or Invisalign or something to redo the straightening.
Good news is, I can still eat better than I could before I got braces.
In other news, seeing the Ear, Nose, and Throat specialist about my sinuses ended up curing the grinding along with mouth breathing and swollen sinuses.
Herald of Darkness by the Old Gods of Asgard. It’s an incredible piece from Alan Wake 2 and the band behind the song is an in universe version of the Poets of the Fall, a fantastic Finnish band.
As much as I love Obelis’ comics (and her as a friend), for years she’s been going in circles with one serial that is her talking about childhood acceptance and two which have a rich world but with the same themes being rebrought up routinely. She knows this and jokes about it sometimes, and I’m not judging her as I know her reasons. I’m just saying any successful reason to change course would be enjoyed.
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