My stepfather doesn’t think that voting matters. He’s thoroughly convinced the “powers that be” have already decided who will win both nominations and who will ultimately be the next commander-in-chief of the United States.
He’s not alone. In the United States, a significant number of people don’t vote. According to the Center for Study of the American Electorate, only 57 percent of registered voters voted in 2012. I used to be among them. As a liberal in Mississippi, I thought voting was irrelevant. Many of my liberal friends agreed with me.
Believing your vote doesn’t matter is paradoxically true. The more people who believe that, the more individual votes matter. The more people who don’t believe that, the less individual votes matter.
Despite my prior apathy, I’m a firm believer in the democratic process. I’ve already sent away my absentee ballot for the Democratic presidential primaries (I’m feeling the sweet, sweet Bern). I’m looking forward to voting in every election cycle from now on.
As Americans, I think we have a moral obligation to be active participants in local, state and federal elections. Without using our power to vote, I believe we don’t have the right to complain about political corruption or lackluster political performance. Our current congress is shortsighted at best, deliberately malevolent at worst. The only way to shift the tide is to change the people occupying the coveted seats.
Politics aren’t fun. Unless you like confrontation and hate your relatives, discussing them makes most people itchy and uncomfortable. Discomfort cannot be an excuse for apathy. Right now, we have a GOP race that’s full of several people with extreme views. We have a Democratic race that could end up being closer than the media wants to admit.
I think disbelief in the democratic process is a nice lie people tell themselves so they don’t feel guilty about their lack of involvement in the government. Our senators, congressmen, congresswomen and all other elected officials should have a healthy fear of their constituents. We have the power to take their job away when they fail us, and we have the right to utilize that power.
If there, somehow, were a person in a pressed grey suit approving presidential candidates with a comically large stamp, I think the past few elections would have been different.
Even if there, somehow, were some ominous, powerful entity running the political gambit, is it not better to try and vote than remain a passive participant in the degradation of American democracy?
My stepdad won’t use his vote, so at least he’s making mine more valuable.
