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Compulsory voting has boosted turnout in Australia – is it time NZ tried it? (www.rnz.co.nz)
submitted 5 months ago by to c/newzealand@lemmy.nz
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I'd love to know what others think about this. My view is it's already very easy to cast a vote, as easy as we can realistically make it, and we should be asking ourselves why fifteen percent of the population don't bother to vote, rather than forcing them to do so.

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[–] 2 points 5 months ago (2 children)

as an Australian, no. why ? why force people who don't want to vote to vote, they clearly don't want to be involved in their democracy and will end up angry voting for some dipshit or other if forced to.

that's not to say people don't make horrific choices regardless, one.just has to scan the elected officials around the world to see neither system leads to an outcome of sanity.

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  • [–] 4 points 5 months ago

    Maybe I'm just too American to see the downsides, but I'd much rather have people voting stupidly than our current situation of voter suppression.

    Introducing the possibility of not voting just seems to encourage those in power to make it harder for 'undesirables' to vote as a way of shaping the election. Thus, those that actually DO want to vote cannot.

    In a system where everyone has to vote, there can be no suppression. Right? Or am I missing something?

    So yes, they can vote stupidly. But no one's voice can be taken away. That seems very important for any sort of democracy to work. Stupid voting can be worked on (though honestly never eliminated as there are always stupid people). But at least you always know you're getting the government people wanted.

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