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Rant about the scapegoating of non-voters, third party, etc.

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funeralxempire
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03 Aug 2020, 3:57 pm

League_Girl wrote:
vividgroovy wrote:
League_Girl wrote:
If you vote 3rd party, you are helping someone win. That was how Trump won. They go with electoral votes so people that don't vote for either party and go for third, one of the upcoming presidents' gets a point...



I can't speak for third-party voters, but here's my take as a non-voter: I could have voted for Trump in the 2016 election. I never had any desire to do so, but the possibility was there. The number of votes I could have given him is 1. The number he got from me was 0. I live in California, which Clinton carried in 2016, so there is no way my one vote would have helped Trump get the electoral votes for my state. And he won the election without winning my state. So even if I had actually voted for him, it would not have helped him in any significant way. Yet this argument claims that by NOT voting for either side, I helped him win?



Not voting also helped him win because we have electoral votes. Half of the US citizens didn't vote. Clinton had more votes than Trump but he won by electoral.



I think what vivid is pointing out that even if he actively did what he could to help Trump it would have accomplished nothing at all towards that goal, so how could he have helped Trump more by doing nothing at all? Where he lived there was effectively nothing he could do to benefit the candidate he preferred because of how many people voted against that candidate there.


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starkid
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03 Aug 2020, 4:28 pm

Brictoria wrote:
The probelm with the claim that "voting 3rd party" or not voting is a vote for the "other" side is there is no way to know whether, had the person voted, they may have instead voted FOR the other side.

Most people who say or post this are probably addressing people who they assume share their politics.



vividgroovy
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03 Aug 2020, 10:50 pm

League_Girl wrote:
vividgroovy wrote:
...So even if I had actually voted for him, it would not have helped him in any significant way. Yet this argument claims that by NOT voting for either side, I helped him win?



Not voting also helped him win because we have electoral votes. Half of the US citizens didn't vote. Clinton had more votes than Trump but he won by electoral.


But Clinton got the electoral votes from my state.

Here are all the different scenarios:

1) I did not vote. (What actually happened.) Clinton won my state and got its electoral votes, but lost the election due to not getting enough electoral votes from other states.

2) What if I voted for Clinton? Clinton would have won my state and gotten its electoral votes, but lost the election due to not getting enough electoral votes from other states.

3) What if I voted for Trump? Clinton would have won my state and gotten its electoral votes, but lost the election due to not getting enough electoral votes from other states.

4) What if I voted third-party? Clinton would have won my state and gotten its electoral votes, but lost the election due to not getting enough electoral votes from other states.

5) What if I wrote in Bernie Sanders, or some other candidate? Clinton would have won my state and gotten its electoral votes, but lost the election due to not getting enough electoral votes from other states.

All of the outcomes are exactly the same. So how did my not voting help Trump win? Trump would have won regardless of what I did.

Now, you might say, what if I had lived in a state where the election results were a lot closer? Unless Clinton lost by one vote in any state, which seems very unlikely, my vote still would not have made any difference to the results. Even then it would be a tie.

Even if we had the popular vote instead of the electoral college, then Clinton would have won regardless of how I voted, because she had far more of the popular vote.