Letters to the Editor: Your 'protest vote' for Jill Stein is really a vote for Donald Trump - eviltoast
  • Olgratin_Magmatoe@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    Again, 6x as many third party votes on the right. Spoiler effect ain’t shit to the left.

    On its own that statistic is meaningless, as it doesn’t tell you how much overlap there is, and therefore how much spoiling there is. And regardless of which side, the spoiler effect is a symptom of a terrible voting system. The entrance of an irrelevant candidate should not sway the results of an election at all.

    Additionally, everything is looking like it will be a very close race, in which case every bit of the spoiler effect matters, even if more of it is on the right, which you haven’t established.

    The overlap exists yes but the DNC has not moved left much in 12 years leaving progressives pretty disenfranchised

    I don’t like it either. But my point stands, there is an alternative choice.

    The problem here is the spoiler effect, the system in which we elect representatives. It is in large part what allows the doupoly to remain uncompetitive.

    • TowardsTheFuture@lemmy.zip
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      7 hours ago

      You say 3rd party is irrelevant but also that 4x(revised now that I looked up exact numbers from 2020) more right 3rd party doesn’t prove it’s more than the left…. If there are only 2 relevant parties then… right goes to right, left goes to left. Shock. Awe. Ignore the weird centrist or actual independent or etc ones as those are hard to place.

      Again, the issue is not that we have any third party vote. We should. It should be encouraged. It’s a fucking democracy. Dems trying to say trump will end democracy while simultaneously trying to remove 3rd parties is wild.

      If we look at 2008 the left actually had 1.16x more than the right on 3rd party votes, and still won by 7% (10x the 3rd party votes on the left) where as 2016 the right had 3x the lefts 3rd party votes (2016 was a big third party year at ~3% right vs ~1% left. Who would guess 2 bad candidates leaves a huge 3rd party.) and then in 2020 the right had 4x the lefts third party votes. If anyone should be worried about “spoiler” candidates it’s the right as their third party has grown a lot more than the lefts. Hell 2020 the left lowered by half of 2008 (Even the crazy year 2016 it was only 0.71% of possible voters, 2020 was only 0.2% of possible voters. 2008 was 0.43% of possible voters.)

      • michaelmrose@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Trump has literally said he would end democracy. Third parties literally by design are either irrelevant or destroy the party they are most like because of the electoral college. Trying to prevent a situation in which a third party acts as a willing pawn to spoil an election is pro democratic in terms of leading to an outcome that is desirable to a larger portion of the electorate.