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Should Voting be Mandatory

Shouold voting be mandatory?

  • Yes, Voting should be mandatory.

    Votes: 4 6.5%
  • No, voting shoudl not be mandatory.

    Votes: 57 91.9%
  • I have no opinion on the subject.

    Votes: 1 1.6%

  • Total voters
    62
  • Poll closed .
No. Sometimes your vote might be None of the above. At least one group I know about and possibly 2 or 3, have religious convictions against voting.

I'm more concerned everyone who WANTS to vote is able to do so without having to scale politically motivated hurdles or other barriers.

1. Eliminate early voting hours re-scheduling that seem to target specific groups for difficulties.

2. Lift the ban on voting rights if someone has been convicted of a crime, unless their US citizenship is also revoked.

3. Figure out how to conveniently fix the new voter ID laws. Interestingly, there were far fewer cases of voter fraud reported prior to these new laws supposedly intended to stop a "widespread problem" the incidents of which you could count on one hand, than the number of people legitimately entitled to vote that were hindered after these laws were enacted. And to make it worse, it back-fired on them with people camping out in parking lots and standing in line till after 11pm to vote after groups feeling targeted turned out in droves. Any fix should include far more severe penalties for anyone caught engaging in voter fraud including those who engage fraudulent voter registration activities, who I understand are under no penalty in most states if they knowingly register illegal registrations, leaving it all to the supervisors of elections to weed out.

I bet those same people manage to stand in line for black friday deals, though. Everyone who WANTs to vote already can do so. In Florida, you can vote 10 days before an election, for 10 hours a day, and you can even mail it in. There is simply no excuse for claiming you werent allowed to vote.
 
Heavens no. We should be looking for ways to keep the idiots out from the process of controlling the most powerful country in the history of humankind, not finding ways to put them in charge.
 
In some countries it is mandatory to vote during elections in other countries this is not the case.

My believe is that it should be mandatory to vote. While voting, you will have the option that you do not want to vote, but at least you have taken the effort. After all there may simply not be a party you would consider worth your support. This way the turnout will obviously be much higher, and, more importantly, the actual votes collected also better represent what the general consensus is of the people in the country.

The choices are

- Yes, voting should be mandatory.
- No, voting should not be mandatory.
- I have no opinion on the subject.

An obvious question for the DebateForum moderators/administrator is of course whether it is possible or not to make voting for polls mandatory as well. Could this be done by sending all members an email to which they need to respond?

All my polls will be hidden from the public in order to avoid a biased response. If people want their opinion to be public they have the choice to announce this with a reply in the thread.

Joey

If the moderators were to e-mail me informing me I had to vote in every idiotic poll here, I would leave here and never return. I don't post that much as it is, and that would be the nail in the coffin for me. You would see folks drop out of this forum. In case you're wondering, no, voting should not be mandatory. We're supposed to live in a free country where people are not forced to do the will of the government. I suppose your view is that the government is the all powerful entity over the people and knows what is best for the sheeple.
 
I think people should be able to cast their ballots with their filed IRS forms.
If several adults are claimed as exemptions, their ballots get files as well.
 
The problem is people who are ignorant when it comes to politics voting. Its why elected officials tend to have a high disapproval rating and high incumbent re-election rate. Forcing people who do not even want to take the time to vote is a horrible idea. A general consensus doesn't mean dick if most of the people voting don't pay attention to what their elected officials are doing.

They do that enough as it is.
 
Automatic registration, to me, comes off as a sleazy way to legitimize those in charge.
Not as bad as an election with only 1 candidate, but close.

How is streamlining the process to make it easier for Americans to vote sleazy? Here I thought the GOP making it harder to vote was sleazy.
 
How is streamlining the process to make it easier for Americans to vote sleazy? Here I thought the GOP making it harder to vote was sleazy.

Registering to vote, is not hard.
To me, it seems the motivation for mandatory registration is something else.

I mean, if you really think registering to vote is hard, then why bother to vote at all.
 
I think the left is merely trying to energize its base, which for the most part has never had any interest in politics. Good luck with that.
 
1. The choices are

- No, voting should not be mandatory.

2. An obvious question for the DebateForum moderators/administrator is of course whether it is possible or not to make voting for polls mandatory as well. Could this be done by sending all members an email to which they need to respond?

1. People have a right not to vote as well. Why make it mandatory? If they are stupid enough to throw that away, how is it any better than those who vote based on name recognition only? That is what the majority of the public does anyway.

2. If DP starts banning people because they don't answer polls, it would fall apart pretty quickly. They can send out a poll message and I've seen other sites do this before, but people will always be able to delete that particular email or spam it out if they don't want to receive it. It would be counter to DPs open discussion policy.
 
Hi joG,

Do you mind to elaborate on the comment 'the restriction on powers only works, if voting is not mandatory.'? Sorry but I am not sure if I follow you here.

The motivation should be that his policies are in the best interest of the people. The vote is merely a reference to see if the people actually agree with his proposed policy or not. In order to achieve that as fairly as possibly you would typically want to have a vote from all the people you represent. And I had proposed after all to allow for a blank vote as well. And that his powers are limited without the necessary votes is a direct result of the votes, or the lack thereof in this case.

I think I tend to agree with you, I just do not see why this should stop voting from being mandatory.


Joey

- If everyone must vote, there is no point in allocating different levels of power to the job dependant on the votes the person collects.

- I find it is not the representative's job to do things in"the best interest of the peoplr". That is a prescription for lousy democracy and uncontrolled political escapade. You want the person you mandate to do, what he promised you he would do and for which promise you mandated him and gave him the job.
 
Registering to vote, is not hard.
To me, it seems the motivation for mandatory registration is something else.

I mean, if you really think registering to vote is hard, then why bother to vote at all.

What? At no point during any of this did you actually answer my question. You made the bold statement that streamlining the registration process was sleazy and would "legitimize those in charge". I guess the people in charge would be a bit more legitimate because there would be MORE voters electing them instead of less.

I can't possibly fathom why you'd be opposed to a high voter turnout. Oh... You're not a GOP voter are you? That would explain it for sure. Those kids are always interested in making it as hard as possible to vote, because when the people don't get out and be part of the political process, it's easy for the angry old white men to swing the vote.
 
I think every citizen should be automatically registered to vote, and it should be able to be done online. That being said, it shouldn't be mandatory. Sometimes you despise both candidates equally and don't want to vote against your conscience. I'd rather have the people without strong convictions on the matter not participate than being forced to pick a candidate.

Why? What if I don't want to be registered to vote?
 
Not mandatory, but everyone should be automatically registered.
 
Not mandatory, but everyone should be automatically registered.

Why do you think people decide to not register to vote? What do you think will be gained by registering them automatically?
 
Why do you think people decide to not register to vote? What do you think will be gained by registering them automatically?

Actually, quite a few people don't even know how. Regardless, automatic voter registration is common sense, there are literally no negatives.
 
Actually, quite a few people don't even know how. Regardless, automatic voter registration is common sense, there are literally no negatives.

Isn't forcing people to be registered by itself a negative? People like myself made a choice to not be registered to vote, and believe it or not, I'm not alone in that decision.
 
Isn't forcing people to be registered by itself a negative? People like myself made a choice to not be registered to vote, and believe it or not, I'm not alone in that decision.
The "forcing" narrative is pretty ridiculous, automatic voter registration at birth is common sense, people won't have to bother registering later in life which saves time. Yeah, you're with a vocal minority.
 
In some countries it is mandatory to vote during elections in other countries this is not the case.

My believe is that it should be mandatory to vote. While voting, you will have the option that you do not want to vote, but at least you have taken the effort. After all there may simply not be a party you would consider worth your support. This way the turnout will obviously be much higher, and, more importantly, the actual votes collected also better represent what the general consensus is of the people in the country.

The choices are

- Yes, voting should be mandatory.
- No, voting should not be mandatory.
- I have no opinion on the subject.

An obvious question for the DebateForum moderators/administrator is of course whether it is possible or not to make voting for polls mandatory as well. Could this be done by sending all members an email to which they need to respond?

All my polls will be hidden from the public in order to avoid a biased response. If people want their opinion to be public they have the choice to announce this with a reply in the thread.

Joey

Well you are a kid and kids are used to being told what to do.

Their parents have been telling them what to do for the past 15 to 20 years.

So therefore kids think like kids.

When you finally grow up you will then see things differently.
 
The "forcing" narrative is pretty ridiculous, automatic voter registration at birth is common sense, people won't have to bother registering later in life which saves time. Yeah, you're with a vocal minority.

Forcing things at birth is still force. You just don't get out of the argument by signing people up for stuff at birth.
 
Actually, quite a few people don't even know how.

In other words, folks that are so uninformed and disinterested that we shouldn't want them voting?
 
Everyone should be able to vote, regardless of who they are.

They are able to, they just can't be arsed, and that's fine. Better they stay home and not screw up the results.
 
I bet those same people manage to stand in line for black friday deals, though. Everyone who WANTs to vote already can do so. In Florida, you can vote 10 days before an election, for 10 hours a day, and you can even mail it in. There is simply no excuse for claiming you werent allowed to vote.

No one (or few people) are prevented from voting. What upset people is once early voting began the GOP leadership in power happen to notice a huge voter turnout in high density black areas was Sunday. Specifically, it turned out, a tradition was developing where after Church black congregations would fill up the church buses and rake parishioners to the libraries to vote. The GOP government in power then decided, "Oh no, we need to get 'spending' under control...sure, that's the ticket! Early voting is cancelled on Sundays after church." This, in a state where the White House was determined by just 500 votes in 2000. Fla. Republican: We wanted to suppress black votes - Salon.com

Then in Ohio, the hours early voting was allowed in predominantly black neighborhoods closed by several hours shorter than the hours allowed in predominantly white republican neighborhoods. Ohio GOP Admits Early Voting Cutbacks Are Racially Motivated | The Nation
 
Absolutely not... in fact, I think a test should be required to show sufficient knowledge before voting on a subject.
 
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