Joy and Austin 24

[brogue]

10 minutes ago, BlessingsVonFundiePants said:

All the focus on convincing people to vote is strange to me. In Australia voting is compulsory,  if you don’t vote you get a fine. It’s about $20 for a first “offence” and increases with each time you fail to vote. The fines are capped at about $150. I admit it’s contradictory to FORCE people to participate in a democratic process...honestly most young people love to vote because all the schools where we vote run bake sales and sausage sizzles and as Election Day is always a Saturday it’s a great place to buy hangover food. 

Honestly elections in Aus would be so dull without the democracy sausage!

[HurricaneBells]

50 minutes ago, brogue said:

Honestly elections in Aus would be so dull without the democracy sausage!

One day, they will put two and two together and have us vote at Bunnings LOL

We usually dont end up with the officially elected representative anyway so a visit to Bunnings on the side would be kind of nice so it isnt a complete waste of time!

[Shadoewolf]

Unfortunately here in the US, voting day is often in the middle of the week. Then the lines are long which makes many people miss work. Some employers are cool about it but most aren't. Then you have voter suppression tactics that mess it all up. People blocking polling stations, machines that are "broken", whole chunks of 100's of voters being purged from the system when they shouldn't be. Then you have the electoral college which needs to just go away. 

[HarleyQuinn]

Fundies get their kids to vote by handing them all victim cards that they feel they need to protect. I can't imagine mainstream people following that with how much the word "snowflake" gets thrown around (incorrectly by nearly every republican I've seen use it, I might add)

[SassyPants]

They get them to vote by: keeping them uneducated and dependent upon the people telling them who to vote for. Why would the unemployed adults who live either at the TTH or in a place like Joe and Kendra refuse to vote or vote for anyone or anything contrary to what JB tells them? They don't have the strength or skills to vote against the hand that feeds and shelters them. I am sure the same applies to others of their ilk (albeit on a less grand scale)

[Knight of Ni]

If voting is compulsory I assume there aren’t any issues with being able to get to the polls. Or voting places being closed. Are people excused from work? 

[SassyPants]

9 minutes ago, Knight of Ni said:

If voting is compulsory I assume there aren’t any issues with being able to get to the polls. Or voting places being closed. Are people excused from work? 

Usually in places where voting is compulsory, voting day is a holiday (or weekend day), so the vast majority of people are already off.

[CarrotCake]

We have voting on Wednesday but they set up voting stations in most trainstations etc. Voting will literally cost you less then 2 minutes.

[SapphireSlytherin]

4 minutes ago, CarrotCake said:

We have voting on Wednesday but they set up voting stations in most trainstations etc. Voting will literally cost you less then 2 minutes.

I can't imagine only taking 2 minutes to vote, especially when there are numerous candidates/offices and propositions/amendments to vote on. 

However, I print out my sample ballot, mark it, and take it with me to the polling place, so it probably takes me about 4-5 minutes, just because I double and triple-check everything before I put my ballot into the machine. I'm amazed at the number of people who vote without educating themselves about all the initiatives.

[Jana814]

In my town we vote at the Catholic Church.  It use to be at the elementary school but that stopped a few years ago. The church has a huge parking lot and it takes me all of 5 minutes because I already know in advance who I’m voting for. 

[SorenaJ]

Here if you can't get off work to vote you can vote early by going to the town/city hall and vote from 6 weeks before the election. Which is generally not a problem because voting is open from 8am-8pm, so hopefully you'll have time off at some point there. 

[SapphireSlytherin]

Some states have "early voting." Mine is not one of them. We have to vote on election day, or via absentee ballot.

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

It various from state to state and county to county in the U.S. My sister is PISSED she can't vote this year, they are in the process of moving from TN to Iowa. TN doesn't allow for early voting or voting via absentee ballots unless you are out of the country, being out of town is not a good enough reason to get an absentee ballot.  TN is also a DEEP DEEP red state with a very high minority population. Minorities tend to vote liberal (democrat for those not in the U.S.) they want to keep those people from voting, they want to keep blacks and Latinx people from voting period, in all conservative states. Red states have tricky voter laws now, the conservatives have gutted the voting rights act because they do NOT want people, especially monitories, to vote. Why, because liberals out number conservatives in this country. 

We are not given time off to vote, voting is done (for the majority of state and national elections) on the 1st Tuesday after the 1st Monday in November.  Our voting system was set up in 1776 and hasn't changed since, because change is bad to conservatives.

 

[nickelodeon]

So, they voted for Hill, right? (Whom I only know because of the "#metoo is just like lynching" radio ad that was so bizarro that even he disavowed it)

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

7 minutes ago, SapphireSlytherin said:

Some states have "early voting." Mine is not one of them. We have to vote on election day, or via absentee ballot.

My state does have, we can vote at our country seat starting like 45 days prior to election day, that is only Monday - Friday between 8:00 am and 4:00 pm. Saturday Oct 27 and Saturday Nov 3rd we can vote at our county Administration building, my daughter is coming home from Uni this weekend and we are going to go down Saturday and vote. Not sure if there will be a line as it is a VERY VERY conservative part of the state and very rural once you get outside of my town and the town the county administration stuff is in.  My town is VERY conservative, we have about 6 thousand registered votes in our town and 8, yes EIGHT polling locations, we are conservative, wealthy and white, so no waiting in long lines for us. My friend who lives in Des Moines city limits in a very liberal neighborhood with over 12k voters has 2 voting locations, and usually only 4 voting machines per location. And this is beyond generous for conservatives to do to a liberal minority group. In Dodge City, Kansas they have 13k voters and ONE polling place, this town is over 60% Hispanic, the ONE poling place is outside the city limits more than 1 mile from the nearest bus stop. It is blatant voter suppression, and as if all this wasn't bad enough, the state auditors sent newly registered votes the WRONG address to vote at.   Thankfully the DNC is scrambling to get people to Dodge City to shuttle voters back and forth to the polls. 

Then ND has disenfranchised Indigenous people living on reservations, by saying you must have a street address to either register to vote or to get the proper ID to be able to vote period (I can't remember which) but the Feds forced native people to these reservations and only gave them PO boxes.  Such a fucking disgrace.

[fluffernutter]

About the bridesmaid thing, My daughter is getting married next year and she got these gorgeous notes that said something like "Will you be my bridesmaid?" and presented it to the people she wanted in her party. It was cute I guess. I am just more pragmatic and find it all just... a bit much. Kinda like gender reveals. 

[freshlemonade]

I really am torn about this photo.   I hate some of the things they stand for and a lot of the politicians they (presumably) vote for, but I can't be mad at them for voting.  

Also, sometimes I get the feeling they just vote for whomever is pro-life without consideration for any other issues.

[SassyPants]

I ALWAYS absentee vote, early.

[Audrey2]

I am happy that Oregon is vote-by-mail. all registered voters get their ballot sent to them. You can drop off your ballot at most Town Halls and Libraries, or you can mail your ballot back.

The only two things that concern me are that I think it's harder to bring your children up as this is what we do- we vote. I remember going to the poles with my parents in Ohio when I was a child. We made it a family outing. The other thing that I can see is potentially problematic is that one partner could coerce the other person or even vote for the other person and then just have the other person sign the back of their envelope.I could see some of the controlling jerks that we talk about on this website sitting down with their spouse and saying you will vote this way you will vote that way even if deep down in her heart she might disagree.

[Iamtheway]

In Sweden voting is always on a Sunday and it’s really easy to vote before the day. In my town the library had early voting for a couple of weeks. You can also send in your vote by mail. 

It’s not compulsory to vote but in the last election I think 86% of the people eligible to vote did vote. 

I knew the system was complicated in the US but I didn’t know it was this bad. How’s that democracy?

[albanuadh_1]

As far as I can recall, we've had early voting in Nova Scotia. Usually 3 separate days and I believe, you have to be allowed at least 2 hours off to vote.

[JillyO]

4 minutes ago, Iamtheway said:

In Sweden voting is always on a Sunday and it’s really easy to vote before the day. In my town the library had early voting for a couple of weeks. You can also send in your vote by mail. 

It’s not compulsory to vote but in the last election I think 86% of the people eligible to vote did vote. 

I knew the system was complicated in the US but I didn’t know it was this bad. How’s that democracy?

Germany is very similar. Elections are always on Sunday, so most people have the day off. We also have early voting in town halls for severals weeks before each election, Monday through Friday during normal working hours. And you can always get an absentee ballot if you can't make it in person (no need to give a reason, you just need to apply in person or via mail, and they will send you your absentee ballot).

I've sometimes been able to just walk in and vote right away, in-and-out within two minutes. Other times, I've had to wait for 20 minutes. But I actually like it when I have to wait, since it means a lot of people are voting. Since it's on a Sunday, very few people are in a rush. Now I want bake sales and BBQs like they have in Australia though!

The voting experience in the US is just shameful.

[Meggo]

In some towns near me (in SW Ontario) you can vote via phone and electronically. In addition to going to the polls. 
I haven't figured out how that works (it's not every town, do they opt in, how do they know it's you?). I'm not a voter here (I'm an American living here) but I'm fascinated by it. Imagine how much easier that would be? 

You could vote in person, by mail, via phone or electronically. Like - surely everyone could find a way to do ONE of those... 

(I vote absentee in my home state and my ballot has been sent along for the November elections) 

 

[SassyPants]

Elections...just another reason the US is behind the rest of the world.

The US is not a democracy (too bad it isn't). It is a Democratic Republican. Evidently the powers that be thought that citizens are too unintelligent as to vote for candidates all on their own volition.

[singsingsing]

25 minutes ago, Meggo said:

In some towns near me (in SW Ontario) you can vote via phone and electronically. In addition to going to the polls. 
I haven't figured out how that works (it's not every town, do they opt in, how do they know it's you?). I'm not a voter here (I'm an American living here) but I'm fascinated by it. Imagine how much easier that would be? 

You could vote in person, by mail, via phone or electronically. Like - surely everyone could find a way to do ONE of those... 

(I vote absentee in my home state and my ballot has been sent along for the November elections) 

 

I live in southwestern Ontario and I’ve never heard of this! Interesting...

I always like to vote on Election Day. Not sure why, it’s kind of silly but I just like being a part of the fun that day. I weirdly love elections. Sucks when they don’t turn out well, though.