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PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   30025 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 1, 2024

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The core of the disagreement is whether VBM (especially optional-VBM where anyone that wishes can go in person if they choose!) is sufficiently protective of the right to a secret ballot.

Those cites were pretty clear that the only consistent way to ensure the secret ballot and voter faith in such is in-person voting, with only one person being allowed in the voter booth at a time. They explicitly call out weaknesses of VBM in these terms. I am manufacturing nothing. It's there, in black and white, preserved by the beauty of the internet.

You can't see that a bunch of consensus in favor of the secret ballot is not a consensus against VBM unless one also believes a separate fact about it?

Maybe it's best to return to pragmatics. I got my ballot in the mail, I filled it out at home where no one was here. I sealed it and dropped it off personally at a drop box inside the police station. I am totally satisfied in the secrecy of this ballot, and I don't even think that going in person (which was a choice I could have made) would have further protected it.

In terms of attack modeling, if the police and the registrar are in on the scheme, then neither method would have protected it.

You can't see that a bunch of consensus in favor of the secret ballot is not a consensus against VBM unless one also believes a separate fact about it?

One that the consensus explicitly states.

Obviously not, given the current state of affairs.

Refusing to actually accept that people disagree on a key point is no way to go through life.

Oh my. Let me ever so slightly rephrase. One that the consensus explicitly stated as of a few years ago. Refusing to accept what the public historical record unambiguously states on a key point is no way to go through life.

It's not only about whether you are satisfied with secrecy of your voting. It's also about whether other voters are satisfied that your vote was not coerced. What evidence other than your own testimony could you offer?

I can say, in the counterfactual that I was coerced, I could still have gone to vote in person which would have invalidated my mail-in ballot.

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