Even though Australia does have Mandatory Voting - there's 2 points. 1) You DO NOT have to Enrol to vote. My daughter has never enrolled and never voted and has never heard a peep from the AEC. They only go after people who are enrolled and 2) they basically don't enforce it.
I missed a vote once because I rocked up and the queue was like 200 metres so I just left. I got notice "warning" me that next time I "might" be charged the $200 no voting fee. I know plenty of people who haven't voted and never got the fine.
Also, not having compulsory seems to only help the left who are motivated activists, whereas most right voting people are too busy running their businesses and supporting their communites.
The most ridiculous thing though is that only two levels of government have compulsory voting, not the local government level - and that is where most of the bullshit starts, at grassroots levels like Drag Story Time. So, I would actually like to see compulsory voting at that level but not at the federal level. Honestly, in this day and age in Australia, everyone has to have a MyGov account for government services, so there's really no need for actual polling booths - they could just do the whole thing through MyGov and save millions of dollars. And then the voting could be audited for Shenanigans; Which is probably the real reason they don't do it.
Honestly, in this day and age in Australia, everyone has to have a MyGov account for government services, so there's really no need for actual polling booths - they could just do the whole thing through MyGov and save millions of dollars. And then the voting could be audited for Shenanigans; Which is probably the real reason they don't do it.
Online voting is an incredibly bad idea. For one thing, it makes electoral fraud at scale way easier - no longer needing boots on the ground means you can flip elections even in deep red areas from the comfort of Google HQ. And the kind of audit you're talking about, where you can associate individual votes with individual voters and persecute them for it - is exactly what the secret ballot is meant to prevent.
I like the idea of mandatory voting, even with fines and jail time, so long as there is a: "Abstain" or "Abstain all elections for X years" option on every ballot.
"Abstain" would be putting in a blank ballot, or better to prevent shenanigans, one with marks on all spots. Votes are still, for now, done in secret, they can only confirm you went up to a podium, and put in a paper.
Right, that's called "spoiling your ballot". I'm just saying there should be an officially recognized version of that, rather than act of civil disobedience.
Even though Australia does have Mandatory Voting - there's 2 points. 1) You DO NOT have to Enrol to vote. My daughter has never enrolled and never voted and has never heard a peep from the AEC. They only go after people who are enrolled and 2) they basically don't enforce it.
I missed a vote once because I rocked up and the queue was like 200 metres so I just left. I got notice "warning" me that next time I "might" be charged the $200 no voting fee. I know plenty of people who haven't voted and never got the fine.
Also, not having compulsory seems to only help the left who are motivated activists, whereas most right voting people are too busy running their businesses and supporting their communites.
The most ridiculous thing though is that only two levels of government have compulsory voting, not the local government level - and that is where most of the bullshit starts, at grassroots levels like Drag Story Time. So, I would actually like to see compulsory voting at that level but not at the federal level. Honestly, in this day and age in Australia, everyone has to have a MyGov account for government services, so there's really no need for actual polling booths - they could just do the whole thing through MyGov and save millions of dollars. And then the voting could be audited for Shenanigans; Which is probably the real reason they don't do it.
Online voting is an incredibly bad idea. For one thing, it makes electoral fraud at scale way easier - no longer needing boots on the ground means you can flip elections even in deep red areas from the comfort of Google HQ. And the kind of audit you're talking about, where you can associate individual votes with individual voters and persecute them for it - is exactly what the secret ballot is meant to prevent.
Why does your government insist on running your country like it's still mostly a prison colony?
I like the idea of mandatory voting, even with fines and jail time, so long as there is a: "Abstain" or "Abstain all elections for X years" option on every ballot.
"Abstain" would be putting in a blank ballot, or better to prevent shenanigans, one with marks on all spots. Votes are still, for now, done in secret, they can only confirm you went up to a podium, and put in a paper.
Right, that's called "spoiling your ballot". I'm just saying there should be an officially recognized version of that, rather than act of civil disobedience.