Your vote matters — probably more than you think – Unexpected Values

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(This post is meant to persuade you to vote. If you already want to vote but don’t have a concrete voting plan, check out this post.) In 10th grade civics class I learned about two moral arguments in favor of voting in elections. The first of these appeals to a notion of civic duty: as a citizen of a democracy, you have a moral duty to vote in elections. The second is about political efficacy: your vote could determine the outcome of an election, which can make your town, or state, or country, or the world, a better place. Put simply, an appeal to political efficacy says that your vote matters. At the time I thought the political efficacy argument was a silly one. Sure, an election you’re voting in could be decided by one vote, but the probability of that is very small. On the other hand, the civic duty argument appealed to me. Intuitively, “you ought to vote” is a pretty good principle for a society to have, because without it the democratic system wouldn’t function. Nowadays I don’t

Eric Neyman Elections , Morality , Philosophy , Politics , Public policy , Rationality October 8, 2020 December 7, 2020 (This post is meant to persuade you to vote. If you already want to vote but don’t have a concrete voting plan, check out this post .) In 10th grade civics class I learned about two moral arguments in favor of voting in elections. The first of these appeals to a notion of civic duty : as a citizen of a democracy, you have a moral duty to vote in elections. The second is about political efficacy : your vote could determine the outcome of an election, which can make your

Your vote matters — probably more than you think – Unexpected Values

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