Voting is pretty awesome if you think about it. All you have to do is fill out a couple sheets of paper, check a few boxes and voila! You’ve helped decide what your local, state and federal government will decide to do for the next couple years.
Historically, people didn’t get to have a say in what their government did. Even now, many elections across the world are corrupted, and citizens of these countries remain unable to affect the system that is supposed to represent them. Our system, while by no means perfect, is rather unique in many respects, and we Americans are blessed to be able to have a say in our government in the way that we do.
But stop asking people to vote. Seriously. Stop. It’s not helpful. Stop registering people. Stop posting things on social media encouraging them to vote. Stop asking your friends if they’ve voted. Please. No more.
It’s noble that we want to encourage people to vote. Citizens should be involved in the civic process in any democracy and, considering the current political climate in the United States, I would rather a larger section of the population vote to elect a more moderate set of representatives than leaving the extremes of both parties to their own devices. (On another note, for the love of God, please start voting in primaries; I can’t handle another Clinton vs. Trump election).
But as noble as your intentions assuredly are, merely encouraging people to vote is not enough.
Expanding the number of people who are voting is great, but only if those people know what they are voting on. Registering to vote or going to early voting is not some magical process by which people become wise or politically literate. Such drives encourage people who may not be that interested or informed about the political situation to vote without knowing what they are voting for.
How many voters in North Carolina will have read and understand what each of the six proposed amendments do? Do you, dear reader, know what the pros and cons of each of these amendments might be? I would guess that a majority of you do not, but you still plan on voting on the amendments or have already done so.
Voting should not be the means by which we pursue civic engagement. Voting should be the end result of a process of civic engagement that we embark on as a consequence of the responsibility of citizenship. Instead of encouraging people to vote, we should encourage them to become better citizens.
Perhaps, instead of voting, we should encourage people to go to local government meetings, encourage more constructive discussion between conservatives and liberals or encourage people to know what the Constitution says.
