You wouldn't take a stupid person's advice on anything serious, so why do you let them vote on to how your life is affected by government?
Why should stupid people have a vote?
- Thread starter Drifterwood
- Start date
rob_just_rob
Sexy Member
I agree. That said, I would go one step further and disregard your opinion on this subject.
So, at this point we have one vote in support of this contention.
:smile:
So, at this point we have one vote in support of this contention.
:smile:
- Mem,
Because you may be denied a vote for starting this thread. I'm on the line with Washington now.:wink: I'm kidding of course, but who is to decide what stupid is? You want an IQ test before you press the lever?
Principessa
Expert Member
True, but unless I get to be the one who decides who is too dumb to vote; then it's not a good idea. :smile:
He didn't miss your point at all. As Pecker implied (I think), though he didn't actually say, the reason stupid people get the vote is because who's to say what constitutes stupid? They kept blacks from the polls by introducing literacy tests when most of them (because it was recently illegal to teach them) couldn't read, and they introduced a poll tax when most of them couldn't afford it. Both measures Ann Coulter is in favor of reintroducing.
I think it might be a good idea to test people voting to make sure they are familiar with the issues and the cantidates before they are allowed to cast their ballot, but again, the opportunity for abuse here is too high. Should people be excluded from voting because they believe Saddam Hussein was an imminent threat to national security? Should we turn people away from the polls if they believe 9/11 was an inside job? Large swaths of the population that would vote for one side or the other would be cut out this way, so even if the rest of us think they are ridiculous for believing what they do, it's too easy to introduce bias into a test for voting. If we introduced a test of people's ability to think critically for themselves, that would exclude virtually everyone with a political party affiliation.
Winston Churchill is often credited with the quote though I think he was paraphrasing Ben Frankling when he said, "it has been said Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried." Certainly other forms of government that do not include universal suffrage have long histories of abuse and corruption... but I'm not sure I agree they were necessarily worse. American democracy has been pretty much hopelessly corrupted itself. Because all stupid people *are* allowed to vote, rather than preventing corrupt politicians from staying in office for long as was intended, it has actually become an enabling force for them to do so. Stupid people believe whatever crap the corporations want them to believe, so it comes down to who spends the most advertising dollars, who comes up with the best commercials and slogans, who owns the most radio and cable news programs, and who can come up with the correct formula that will produce speeches and party platforms that appeal to the largest number of stupids while alienating the smallest number. So in theory we have a government by and for the people, while in reality we have a government by and for corporate interests and the military-industrial complex. Our democracy is still controlled by a small number of corrupt individuals, because they are smarter (or at least better informed) and wealthier than most of us they can manipulate the larger system. Really not much has changed.
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Because the stupid people voted into power the time before have a vested interest in keeping the system working that way.
Stupidity is self perpetuating.
rob_just_rob
Sexy Member
Principessa
Expert Member
I'd let you and many of the people here vote.
I wouldn't let most of my ex-boyfriends, or cousins vote though.
:biggrin1:
Well, actually yes he did, because I was talking about the theory of democracy, not racists manipulating a system, or sexists or any other group for that matter. And not being American, your form of democracy is not my reference point either.
Please let's not talk about the flaws of the IQ system etc, but democratically elected people don't have to convince the smartest people to vote for them.
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