Originally posted by: Martin
Originally posted by: Linflas
Originally posted by: Scouzer
Originally posted by: brxndxn
Originally posted by: Scouzer
We (Canada and the US) need proportional representation like Europe. This is the only way to make voting matter.
Where I live, the Progressive Conservatives will be elected every time no matter what. Therefore, there is no point whatsoever in voting.
Then register for their party and vote for a candidate that isn't a Progressive Conservative. There.. you had influence.
How? If the PC wins my riding, then my vote is wasted. The PC wins over 80% of the vote every time, therefore there's no influence whatsoever.
So in reality you have a problem with majority rule since 80% of your fellow citizens don't agree with your choice of representation. Are you one of those that think that everyone should get a trophy or ribbon in a school contest so there are no "losers"?
Do you even know wtf you're talking about? We're talking about the British first-past-the-post parliamentary system. Under this system, you vote for an MP from your riding, not for the party. Thus, if you live in a riding such as mine or Scouzer's and disagree with the majority
in your neighbourhood, your vote is wasted.
Example: the 2007 Ontario election. The NDP rep won my riding by with ~40%, so he gets to represent 100% of the people based on what 40% of them wanted. Because his 40% support is about twice that of other parties, the other 60% know their vote is essentially wasted.
So you know what happened province wide? 8% of people voted for the Green party, but because of this flawed system, there aren't ANY representatives from that party! So how can anyone support a system which fails to represent such significant parts of the population? And then people wonder why turnouts are lower compared to Europe.
Now, I talk about Canada, but the system we have here is very similar, but actually better than the one in the US - you guys haven't even figured out that you shouldn't let politicians gerrymander the districts based polls.