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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   Edited 2yr ago   19148 thread views

USA Election Day 2022 Megathread

Tuesday November 8, 2022 is Election Day in the United States of America. In addition to Congressional "midterms" at the federal level, many state governors and other more local offices are up for grabs. Given how things shook out over Election Day 2020, things could get a little crazy.

...or, perhaps, not! But here's the Megathread for if they do. Talk about your local concerns, your national predictions, your suspicions re: election fraud and interference, how you plan to vote, anything election related is welcome here. Culture War thread rules apply, with the addition of Small-Scale Questions and election-related "Bare Links" allowed in this thread only (unfortunately, there will not be a subthread repository due to current technical limitations).

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Okay, and do you have a concrete story for today? Say, all votes are on paper, the scheme is that everyone take home a carbon copy of their own ballot. What problems do you expect it to bring, today?

Stage one is people who are out and proud about their partisan identity showing off their ballot receipts.

Stage two is this becoming a social norm in environments where "everyone" votes the same way, such that not showing your receipt with a correct vote is defecting (cf pronouns in wokestupid spaces or prayers in secular-but-tribally-Christian ones).

Stage three is defectors suffering professional consequences such that there is no longer a meaningfully free vote.

I think this could happen within 2 years given the current level of partisan bitterness in America.

Different effects in different places. This is a vast country with lots of different local cultures. The example above shows how a local culture can produce very perverse results. We can eliminate any concern in any locale if we just take to heart the lessons of those who came before us and insist on a secret ballot.

If you had asked me 5-10 years ago how the history of freedom of the press (as in 'printing', not as in 'journalist') mattered at all in the internet era, I probably wouldn't have been able to predict what actually transpired in the following years. But I hope I would have thought that it was a hard-fought, good lesson that society learned in the past, so it shouldn't be trivially dismissed.

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