As I made my way over to the Puff Daddy special today, a sketchy-looking fellow with pseudo-dreadlocks yelled a question my way: "Have you voted today?" I told him I had not, and he warned me that if I did not vote, "we won't win."
I intend to vote tomorrow, although it unfortunately means riding up to Mason, Ohio with a friend who plans on spending several hours at home with his family. But despite this obstacle, I feel as if I should vote. I care about what happens to the world, and so I care about voting and hopefully thus directing the world in some direction. I have paid too much attention to this campaign to not do anything. But can I do anything? Does one vote matter?
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My shoes are starting to leave chalk footprints on the carpet of my room. I see the word “vote over a dozen times on the walk from my dorm to class in the morning. Someone on this campus really, really wants me to vote. Still, as John and I sit here chatting about the big day tomorrow, we can’t help but play devil’s advocate. No matter how loudly the sidewalk screams, “VOTE OR ELSE!” we can’t help but wonder…or what? What is the significance of our two little votes?
And yeah, yeah, I hear you. “Ohio is a swing state! We’re crucial to this election!”
Well, what about me? I’m an Indiana voter. Is my vote worth anything?
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So there you go, the call to exercise your civic duty and the voice of doubt.
Forty-four minutes til the big day kicks off. See you at the polls?
10 comments:
Whoops- I did not mean to be anonymous that first time. John or Dr. Sitter, if you can delete it go ahead, but it won't let me take the comment off. Here it is under my own name. (Sorry!)
Well, you won't see me at the polls- I voted absentee for Cuyahoga County, Ohio. But I did vote. I like to picture the worst case scenario for situations such as these: the more people who take that attitude of "my vote does not matter," the fewer the number of people who actually control the election. Hypothetically, if nearly everyone took that stance, only a few people in each state could decide where their electoral votes would go.
Yet, to a degree, I conceed that your are both right- in the grand scheme of things, unless you're part of a swing state or a hotly contested congressional district, your ballot will probably not make that much of a difference. However, you can work to make your voice heard for the next four years (regardless of who is elected today) and attempt to persuade more people to agree with you. In this country there is much more to politics than simply voting; so many other ways to make your opinion heard are out there if you only take the time and effort to speak up.
From the polling, Indiana is actually looking like more of a tossup than Ohio...
How can you even say that your vote doesn't matter? I mean sure, in the grand scheme of things, your vote is a very small percentage of the decision. However, it is a percentage! As we said in class today, only about 50% of eligiable Americans usually vote, which means that we are probably not electing officials that truly relect who we are as a country. (Little known fact...there are more registered Democrats than Republicans in the US, but more Republicans vote.(according to my government teacher from last year)).
Also, even if your voice is rather small in national elections, there are some elections every year (for like school board memembers and other local offices) where only like four people vote. These are the people who are directly influencing your life close to home, so it is important to have a say in who those people are.
I'm sorry, but I get really worked up when people start suggesting that vote really don't matter (obviously).
I would have to agree with Laura. It is easy to say, "Does my vote really count?", but it does. If we were to look at recent history in close elections we are able to see the impact of a small percentage of votes. The 2000 election race between Bush and Gore was very close. If more people would have shown up to vote or were more apathetic regarding his or her vote, the results could have been very different. In the end, yes each of our votes may not be significant in the long run, but it starts to become significant when a large mass of people start thinking in this manner. It is our duty to vote and we should each fulfill our job.
A small number of votes put together might count, but my one vote still can't do much in a state with more than 10 million people.
I don't mean to discourage voting itself. I voted in the primaries for a candidate who didn't win in Ohio, but I was glad I cast my vote. Despite all of this, I still find it interesting to consider that my one vote will likely not change a thing on the national scale.
But I did end up voting anyway.
I voted. It doesnt matter how small your voice is, you can still make a difference
Your vote may not matter much for the president, because of the amount of people voting, but some of the other races are decided by just a few votes. For example, I am from Minnesota and the senate race there was only decided by 300 votes last time I checked. This shows that your vote really does matter for some of the races.
I agree with Pat in that my vote in local races or races that involve state officials is more signifficant than my vote in the presidential election.
For the presidential election I feel like my vote really didn't count anyway since I voted for Obama and I am from Kentucky, which went to McCain. So even though I voted for Obama it didn't matter since all of Kentucky's electoral votes went to McCain.
Pat and Tyler make very good points. Voting for local and state officials has always seemed more important to me because it is one case in which my vote really can make a difference. I do my research and carefully think about whom i want to represent me and I put a great deal of thought into the local elections. However, for the first time since Johnson, Indiana went blue and I can't help but think that my vote may have been a part of that. Many of my friends said they wouldn't even bother voting because Indiana would be predictably red, but I guess if everyone thought that way, Indiana wouldn't have turned blue.
Okay sure, so maybe you're really not making too much of a difference on the larger scale. But instead think about your civic responsibility as an American citizen to vote. What if everyone decided they weren't going to vote simply because they believed their vote didn't count? It'd be disastrous I think. It's your duty; if you're going to take advantage of the freedoms American gives you, pay it back in a small way please. P.S.-I'm very happy you voted John.
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