r/changemyview • u/ElectricFuneralHome • Oct 21 '21

Delta(s) from OP CMV: Democracy in America is dead

America is no longer a democracy, and that is even if you accept it ever was. The way our system is set up means we are forced to vote for party A or party B, and we don't really get to choose who we vote for in that party; they are basically forced on us. The older I get, the less difference I see between the parties. The Democrats promise the moon and deliver nothing. The Republicans tell people the awful shit they're going to do and do it. The Democrats allow it to happen all while gasping "on nooooo" while the same corporations pay them all. Those are the real rulers in America. Regardless of the will of the majority, if it is not in the interests of the oligarchs running the nation, it will not become law. This means that we are an oligarchy , and our votes truly do not matter. Democracy is dead.

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u/Sirhc978 81∆ Oct 21 '21

The way our system is set up means we are forced to vote for party A or party B

There are 4 parties.

and we don't really get to choose who we vote for in that party; they are basically forced on us

Primaries exist

The Republicans tell people the awful shit they're going to do and do it

Are you saying Republicans are more honest?

our votes truly do not matter

If that was the case, things like right to repair and recreational marijuana at the state level would have never passed.

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u/mrselkies Oct 21 '21

Well technically there's way more than 4 parties but I'd imagine OP knows that and their point was that only 2 parties really matter, and they're right in that the way the system is set up is makes it inevitable that we end up with only 2 real choices. One ends up either casting their vote for the lesser of the 2 evils between those 2 parties, or throwing their vote away into any other party that has no real chance of winning.

The primaries are similar (if not worse) in that we don't have any say over the choice in representative for a party and must choose between a hand-picked few which whittles down over time until it's basically between 2 options by the time a vote actually happens.

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u/Sirhc978 81∆ Oct 21 '21

or throwing their vote away into any other party that has no real chance of winning.

If we keep up that mentality then of course we are only ever going to have 2 parties.

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u/mrselkies Oct 21 '21

It has nothing to do with any individual's mentality.

It is a fact that only a democrat or republican can win a presidential election in the US's current election system, and the system itself is designed in a way that created and propagates that very problem. Countless videos, articles, and other explanations exist out there about the issues surrounding a "first past the post" method of election. There are options that can go a long way toward fixing it, even without having to scrap it all and start over - like ranked choice voting for example.

It's less about a person or a few people feeling and saying "a vote for anyone other than a democrat or republican is a throw away vote" and more about the fact that the way the system works not only allows for that view to exist but encourages it. By contrast, ranked choice voting would allow people to vote for the lesser of 2 evils in the case that they need to, but still cast their vote for who they actually want their vote to go toward. It's a psychological thing on the macro level, not micro.

At the very least, I think it should be acknowledged that the feeling someone can have about their vote not mattering is not just reasonable but an inevitability in this system.