I was fed up to the bowl of myths and erroneous arguments against abstention, so I wrote the text that will serve as a reference to counter the arguments pro-and anti-electoral abstention
Myth # 1: When you vote your vote will not win the party or is redistributed among all parties.
False. This is probably the biggest myth about forbearance. In Canada as elsewhere, the abstention votes compatibilized and non-use does not go to any party. Those who claim otherwise have no evidence or explanation provided. I challenge anyone using this argument to provide me proof of their claims.
But if it scares abstainers, they should withdraw their names from the electoral lists and get rid of their voting card.
Myth # 2: If you vote no, your vote will be stolen.
False. Same reasons as above. I would add that elections in Canada are among the safest and most independent in the world.
If your only reason to vote is to be afraid to let you steal your vote, make the request to be removed from voter lists and burn your voting card. Your vote will not be stolen if you are not registered lists.
If governments can steal the votes of those who have not voted, they could also steal the votes of those who voted for another party.
Myth # 3: Vote for a small party like Rhinoceros help fight against the Conservatives.
False. With the exception of the Green Party and Bloc Québécois, no party Grab minority of seats in the National Assembly and a vote for these parties is not helping to reduce the percentage of conservatives. To fight against the Conservatives, should help lower their percentage. To do this, we should vote for a party that is likely to exceed the percentage of conservatives, the only normally be the Liberal Party and the NDP exceptionally this year. See the example of Myth # 4 for further explanation.
Myth # 4: Voting Bloc Quebecois and Green Party support fuck off the Conservatives.
False. It is a strategic vote. It helps reduce the number of government seats in the National Assembly, but in no case it helps to fuck off the outgoing government
Explanation: Say there are 100 people in Canada and now the election results are 50% for the Conservatives, the Liberals 45% and 5% for the Bloc Québécois (fictitious numbers).
If you and your friend you vote for the Bloc Quebecois, the results become 7% block, 49% for the Conservatives and 44% for the Liberals.
The Conservative lead is the same, they are still in your head and vote for the Bloc has absolutely not been used to reduce their lead. The only way to reduce the advance would vote for the party that has a chance to win and fuck off the Conservatives, in this instance the Liberals.
Strategic voting only serves to prevent a majority government and contributes absolutely nothing to reduce the Conservative lead.
Myth # 5: Vote for a small party helps lower the number of government seats in the National Assembly.
False. The only way to help lower the number of seats in government (and try to avoid a majority) is to vote strategically. A strategic vote is a vote for the Bloc ...
The small parties like the Rhinoceros Party do not get seats in the National Assembly ... To lower the number of seats of government must contribute to give to other parties. If they get none, a vote is unnecessary. And the only party to win seats without taking power, that the nationalist Bloc Québécois
Myth # 6: It is necessary to cancel his vote not to support political parties.
False. Cancel his vote is as bad as that going to vote.
First, the goal is not to vote (in general) to show his disinterest in the current political system. Jump cancel his vote only gives legitimacy to the system and proves he still works. 50% of voters who cancel their vote everyone cares, but 50% abstention AC shook the state and it delegitimizes the current system.
When you vote, about $ 10 goes to the party to fund it. If you cancel your vote by checking boxes 4, this is $ 10 divided by 4 then $ 2.50 goes to each political party. By canceling your vote, you financially support the Conservatives, Liberals, NDP and Bloc. For someone who does not vote for not supporting political parties, cancel the vote is not an option.
Myth # 7: Choose the "least worst" and vote for the right deal.
Liberal: Liberals are not as bad as the Conservatives. In fact, the neo-liberal Liberal Party does as much damage that the Conservative Party, and at the global level. I suggest everyone to learn about the policy of laissez-faire economic and non-state intervention advocated by the Liberal Party. I also suggest to go and read about the ravages of the IMF, World Bank, WTO, NAFTA, the FTAA etc. ... It's all part of the Liberal Party's economic policy which aims to limit state intervention in the economy, which allows multinationals to freely exploit the South thanks to the neo-liberal and neo-colonialism .
I think the last Liberal government of Paul Martin and Jean Chretien have also demonstrated their effectiveness with scams of all kinds, scandals, corruption, theft of public money, cuts in education, lies, etc. ...
NDP: The NDP has never elected so we can not really argue about its effectiveness in office. By cons, history shows us year after year there is no good politician. Take the example of Obama for example, there was hope, everyone believed in him, he had the Nobel Prize for Peace, everyone thought we would finally be a good American government .... Where are we today? Obama has lied and betrayed all his prommesses. It was supposed to end the war in Afghanistan and Iraq, it was supposed to close Guantánamo, abolish the Patriot Act, etc. .... None of this has been done, he betrayed all his promises and lied to his constituents .... Not to mention the health reform is a disaster for the benefit of private insurance companies ... Obama is too pro-Israel and his first action as president was to order an attack on a Palestinian village ...
The only way to counter the right to vote is to put the power of neo-liberals who will also be worse. Those who argue the election will say we must vote for the right deal, well fortunately they are not in France because the National Front in what they are facing is nothing compared to the small Conservative Harper.
Myth # 8: Voting is a duty.
The Constitution (at least that the United States) also says that "when injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty." If you consider that the electoral system is an injustice, it is therefore the duty to resist and not to participate and encourage them by legitimizing.
From a standpoint anarchist or anti-capitalist, or point of view of anyone who does not feel represented by a major political party, boycotted the state and its electoral system is illegitimate duty.
Myth # 9: Elections are a democratic system where the majority of the people elect a government.
Wrong wrong wrong.
According to Elections Canada, the official number of registered voters was 23,971,740.
There are 34,019,000 people in Canada (Wikipedia, 2010 figures)
So 67.65% of the population are registered for election
There were 43% abstention in 2011. So 57% to 67% of the population have voted, or 38% of the population.
The Conservatives won with 40% of the votes. So 40% of votes on 38% of the population = 15%
Result: 15% of the population voted Conservative. The Conservatives thus govern with the support of just 1 in 10 Canadian and a half. That is democracy.
In 2008 was a record low turnout, the Conservatives were elected with the support of 10% of the population. Conversely, 90% of the population does not want this government. This Is What Democracy Looks Like.
15% or 10% of the population who elect a government, no it's not democracy.
Note: white votes and those who cancel their votes are not even counted in this calculation, so the end result is even lower.
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstention # Calcul_du_taux_d.27abstention
Myth # 10: Do not vote it loose.
False. What is cowardly is to elect someone to make decisions for us. Tell me what decisions the government takes the people would be unable to take himself? Vote is the only act of cowardice in this story, most people do it by relieving the conscience and saying they did something to change things, then they will sit on their asses for another 4 years.
Myth # 11: Voting makes a difference.
Really? The political parties are all the same thing, no major changes have NEVER been obtained through elections. All the social gains of 200-300 years were obtained by FIGHT, unemployment up gender equality, to pay equity, constitutions, women's rights, the right to strike, unions, pensions, benefits and social welfare, etc. ...
Radical changes have been obtained either by fighting or by revolution, but never by the elections. Today political parties are all similar and none offers the same major change.
The only thing that the election change is $ 300 million of fresh elections under the pockets of taxpayers.
Yes, voting is used to something: to choose between cancer and AIDS. But a pile of shit is still a pile of shit.
Myth # 12: This is the only possible alternative.
False. Direct democracy and self-management is a reality that is applied across a small scale, and which has often been a large scale. Imagine direct democracy on a small scale in all cities, with popular assemblies so that the people vote on decisions to take (one is able to do so in the national assembly or congress, so why not with ordinary citizens in each city), then imagine a libertarian federalism (see Wikipedia) to unite all such meetings, a kind of pyramid scheme but with the decisions just always there ... CA's would be of direct democracy, Calif., represent the people.
Those who say it is the only alternative are the same people who argue that it took hundreds of years of struggle for the right to vote. Fortunately, those struggles were not like you because they too would have said that the monarchy and dictatorship is the only way forward. If you admire as their struggles, which made like them and fight for a fairer system and boycott injustice.
Learn more about direct democracy:
http://fra.anarchopedia.org/D% C3% A9mocratie_directe
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/D% C3% A9mocratie_directe
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autogestionhttp://www.democratiedirecte.fr/2010/06 ... e-directe/http://www.autogestion.coop/ Myth # 13: The citizens get what they voted.
I suggest we read the statements above to understand why it's totally false. 85% of the population did not support the Conservative government in the 2011 elections, and 90% in 2008. Even if we count only those who voted, over 60% of the population voted against the Conservatives.
Politicians continuously lie and do not respect their promises. Look what happened with Obama, he has betrayed all its election promises and lied to the people.
The people vote for parties not even read their political project in 75% of cases. The arrival of Hitler to power has been well demonstrated. If they vote for a decision instead of voting for someone who will vote in their stead they knowingly.
The war in Afghanistan, the austerity measures, cuts in education, cuts in public services, the fight against gay marriage, the abolition of the register of firearms, opposition to abortion , violations of human rights in G8/G20 etc. .... ARE YOU telling me that is what Canadians want? Are you telling me that is what represents our people? Here as elsewhere the majority of people are against the war in Afghanistan but the government refuses to stop ... The population was never consulted before deciding to go to war. Same for the rest.
Governments are elected by only 10-15% of the population, based on a political project that the majority of voters did not even read. Then elected officials do not even promises of this political project, and make decisions that were not even in their programs, without ever consulting the people's opinion!
Myth # 14: Someone has to decide for us.
The argument that the people are unfit to decide itself is downright anything, normally I hear it from the mouths of fascists. If the people are too stupid, so why let them choose their leaders? Choose between several complex political projects is much more difficult than voting YES or NO on a decision. With this mentality where we might as well abolish democracy to a totalitarian dictatorship fuck with intellectual elite in power because the people are deciding not to cave too??
As Errico Malatesta said so, vote for the people accustomed to ignore their social conditions and to move to change things. Vote determines the people to have someone to care for their problems and kills political emancipation.
Myth # 15: Elect the left advances the social struggle in achieving reforms, a step towards revolution.
I would love to find a single example where the reforms have to go to the revolution but I can not. In fact the reforms are only used to kill the protest movement and kill the social struggles in soothing the anger of the people. Sad to say, but history has shown us that the only occasions when people rise to overthrow a government and get radical social change is when the worst tyrants in power. It's always when things are going badly for the people to move. When they get the reforms they sit on their small western comfort in saying that "less is worse than elsewhere"
Myth # 16: abstainers have to form their own political parties
And if abstainers were against the concept of political parties against the electoral system against the state and against the parliament?
Myth # 17: If you do not vote, not just whining about the government
Since when voting is the only way to act? We could tell you not to complain if you do nothing, rather than elect ... The problem is that even if we vote and we put a new government to replace the old one will complain anyway and there we have really no reason to do so since we have voted for this government . Even worse, it will be complicit in what he could do.
In fact, in many cases, those who do not vote to move more voters to change things.
Conclusion & perspective anarchist / anti-capitalist
If you've read this far, you will understand that the only way to counter the Conservative government is to vote for one of the other two main parties: Liberal or NDP. And even then, 2011 is an exceptional situation since until now he had to vote between liberals and conservatives because the NDP had never won more than 20% of the votes (2011 is a record for the NDP)
It's not everyone who feel represented by these two political parties here, we must stop blaming non-voters for their choice not to vote. We are not obliged to vote, encourage and support a political party that does not represent us and a party that disagrees with his ideas.
From the point of view and anti-capitalist anarchist: Whatever the ruling party, the state remains the state with its share of injustice, oppression, repression, inequality and exploitation. .. Parties does not change significant enough to deny his beliefs and going to stoop to maintain an electoral system illegitimate and encourage the circus of the state.
Anarchists want the people to take decisions themselves, they do not want to elect someone to take their place, whatever the color of the departed. The government does not represent the people, but a minority of people from 10% to 15%. Only the people can represent himself.
Yes, it took hundreds of years to fight for voting rights and democracy. But how many hundreds of years older he will fight for true democracy, direct democracy? Today you vote for parties who trample the rights he had as many years of struggle to obtain, and it does not seem to shock you.
Some quotes:
"Political parties are like Smarties, they are different colors but all the same thing goutent"
"Elections pass but the problems remain"
"If voting could change something, they would have made it illegal" - (Emma Goldman)
"Until now our job to vote merely involved recruiting enemies among those who call themselves our friends" - (Elisha Recluse)
"Politically, the weakness of the argument of the lesser evil has always been that those who choose the lesser evil forget very quickly that they have chosen evil." - (Hannah Arendt)
"He voted yesterday he will vote tomorrow, he will always vote. Sheep go to slaughter. They do not say anything, them, and they hope for nothing. More stupid than beasts, more than sheep herding, the voter chooses and appoints his butcher's bourgeois. He has to acquire these rights revolutions "- (Octave Mirbeau. Strike Voter).
"Elections are parodies that use big words - democracy, people, nation, republic, sovereignty - but who can barely conceal the cynicism of governments: it is for them to install and sustain a soft tyranny which produces a one-dimensional man - the consumer stupid and insane - no dictatorship has ever managed to produce. " - (Michel Onfray)
"There is absolutely nothing in the state, from the top to the bottom of the hierarchy, which is to reform abuses, to remove parasites, an instrument of tyranny to destroy ... who puts his hand on me to govern me is a usurper and a tyrant. " - (Pierre-Joseph Proudhon)
"The government of man by man, under whatever name it is disguised, is oppression." - (Pierre Joseph Proudhon)
Errico Malatesta
"Anarchists are, as always, committed opponents of parliamentary and parliamentary tactics.
... Opponent of the parliamentary struggle, because they think that far from promoting the development of popular consciousness, it tends to wean the people to look after itself directly to its own interests and it is a school of servility for some, and lies to others.
We must ensure that workers get used now and as far as possible, resolve themselves their own affairs, associations of different types and not the tendency to rely on others.
We do not want the people accustomed to send his friends in power, or alleged, nor to wait for his emancipation of their accession to power.
We defend all conscious abstention, without worrying whether it can support a particular candidate. For us, this is not the candidate that matters, since we do not believe it is useful to send "good people": what matters is the manifestation of the state of spirit in which people find themselves, and among the thousand and odd states of mind in which a voter may be, the best is the one who makes him realize the futility and danger of the deputies in parliament, and he who drives him to work for him what he wants directly, by associating with those who have the same desires than him.
Parliamentary action, in our opinion, the people accustomed to expect from the top its own emancipation and prepares to slavery.
We want the people who is truly sovereign, we have every interest in preventing it takes seriously sovereignty of pasteboard, and he is content. "
