Mandatory = required by law, a compulsory activity. In other words, you have to or else…
I live in Australia, and here voting is something you HAVE to do according to the law. If you don’t, you get fined and it’s a whole big to-d0. However, when I remember every so often that other countries like the US don’t make voting a compulsory activity, I begin to consider if it’s something that SHOULD be mandatory, or if it was optional if that would make things better or worse… or the same.
Okay, so while this may not be a debate that EVERYONE on this planet has, it is something that people tend to have an opinion on. If it were up to me, voting WOULDN’T be compulsory in Australia. The amount of people that I have known personally, and know of, that don’t give a rats butt about who is in charge of the country – end up voting for whoever and it just ads to a pile of either ineligible vote, or for a person they thought had an interesting name…
On the other hand, when you have a place that doesn’t mandate a vote you have people who end up complaining about how the country is run, but who didn’t even have ANYTHING to do with how that person and party got into power. It sounds like a hollow complaint, because if you don’t like it you can change it… except you were too lazy to go to the voting place on election day. So, yeah.
I am not a particularly political person, so my view on this really just comes down to inconvenience. The fact that I have to do something, that just takes up my time… I do understand the people I kind of roasted above, to an extent. The older I get, the more I do actually care who is in charge of the country. The more I feel that I would like to have a say in who that is. But that doesn’t change the fact that some people will Never be interesting, and are content to just live their lives.
What does the flip side look like? If voting in Australia was optional, like it is in the US would that change anything? Well, probably not. The people who are giving a real vote, would still show up. The people who didn’t want to vote and ended up putting through something that couldn’t be counted anyway, wouldn’t have to fake their voting experience. The people who really cared about who was in charge would still be able to vote. I suppose it comes down to accomodating those few who really just don’t care at all about voting.
If places currently have optional voting were to change the rules, how would THAT look? Well, to be honest I think it would look a little like chaos. Wrangling loads of people who have never voted a day in their lives into the right place, to vote the correct way, and for no incentive other than not receiving a fine.. yeah I don’t see that going very well.
How do you feel about voting? I hear some argue the age should be lowered or raised, that it should be compulsory or optional, and that basically everyone agrees we all want some better candidates than we usually get…
See You in the Adventures (or the voting booths I suppose)
Christy Grace
Christy Grace Scarlet Pen 