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Comment by fargolime | Hacker News Reader

Liberal Nader voters in 2000 were partly responsible for Bush getting elected, because they could have prevented it. Absent instant run-off voting or some other way that a third party can be viable, voting for a third party simply wastes an opportunity to vote against the greater evil. It sends no viable message. The 2 main parties will give it no weight whatsoever, as they have total control.

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This is the second time you've categorised it as choosing "the lesser evil". I don't think that's what the system was designed to be. It sounds to me like it's so far off the rails that the real lesser evil choice is to refuse to participate in the process and rob it of its credibility.

If I vote for the losing party, I implicitly agree to abide by the choices made by the winning party because I would expect the same from their supporters if the roles were reversed. None of the parties represent my interests, so I don't vote and I certainly don't agree to respect the decisions made by those who don't represent my interests.

To tie it back in with the original point, those who voted against Bush implicitly agreed to abide by his decisions if he won. Only those who refuse to participate in the system can claim zero complicity.

> I don't think that's what the system was designed to be.

I think it would require some proof to what design you are referring to.

> It sounds to me like it's so far off the rails that the real lesser evil choice is to refuse to participate in the process and rob it of its credibility.

The result of refusing to participate is that you lose even more freedom to pursue happiness. Your captors don't care a whit about credibility.

> None of the parties represent my interests, so I don't vote and I certainly don't agree to respect the decisions made by those who don't represent my interests.

Then you waste an opportunity to help prevent greater evil from happening. You needn't agree with the lesser evil when you vote for them.

> To tie it back in with the original point, those who voted against Bush implicitly agreed to abide by his decisions if he won. Only those who refuse to participate in the system can claim zero complicity.

The good people who didn't vote in 2000 could have prevented a needless war from happening. They had the opportunity, so they are complicit. Only those who voted for the lesser evil can claim zero complicity.

If you abstain from voting, that doesn't remove you from the process or relieve your implicit obligation under your government.

Even if it did, why would you remove yourself from any philosophical obligation to your government, but live within its laws and regulations? You're basically trying to be separate but, by choice, not really separate and not really equal.

Liberal Nader voters in 2000 were partly responsible for Bush getting elected

False.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/06/1260721/-The-Nader-...

http://www.cagreens.org/alameda/city/0803myth/myth.html

http://prorev.com/green2000.htm

I looked only at the first one. It contradicts sources I saw back in the day. Regardless whether I'm right, the point stands that good 3rd party voters can hand the election to the greater evil.

That's odd, because it backs up sources that I recall, and it links to citations from 2000, and not our vague recollections.

As the first link points out, Monica Moorehead, the Worker's World Party candidate, got 1,804 votes. David McReynolds of the Socialist Party collected 622 votes.

The people who visited for Moorehead, or for McReynolds are the ones you should focus your ire upon. Not those who voted for Nader.

The Socialist Party is more to blame for Bush winning the office than Nader.

Oh, and all those non-voters? They were also partially responsible. And all those who refused to steal ballot boxes from heavily Republican district are also to blame! Because preventing evil justifies everything. Including torture.

Preventing greater violence justifies violence. In general, preventing greater harm justifies harm. Preventing evil doesn't justify everything.

Then you must think pacifists like the Amish are immoral.

And somehow have a magic ball to say what the future brings, and what the alternative future might have been.

This seemingly reasonable argument (assuming that you do not reject violence as fundamentally immorally ) is how Augustine turned a religion of peace into one with soldiers, as Just War theory.

But it doesn't stop. It also twists a phrase like "imminent threat of violent attack" into "does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons will take place in the immediate future" and "enemy militant" into "all military-age males in a strike zone, unless there is explicit intelligence posthumously proving them innocent."

The calculus of violence is very coarse, yet you want to hang us all on its balance scales of greater or lesser violence and harm.

So if you see a little kid getting raped, you won't touch the rapist? Pretty sure even the Amish would take some action.

False dilemma. Inaction != non-violence.

Your political opinions are not universal, and those who disagree with you are not evil, and frankly your way is stupid and the reason the mess perpetuates.

I upvoted your political opinion. Of course mine isn't universal, because not everyone has my rock solid ethics. (And that's party because rather than analyze their own choices in the face of others', they call others' choices stupid.) It is certainly evil to support violence, like torture, when it isn't the best choice to prevent greater violence.

Thus, the problem with "First Past the Post".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo

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