Political Poll

[c9]

Situation: You wake up, grab your coffee, sit at the computer. Up comes the www.vote.gc.ca website. You punch in an ID number, and then vote on a dozen little issues such as "should your children be taught in both English and French equally?" "should the city repave Mill Street or build a new bike path?" or "Do you want a $100 tax cut in 2006, or should that money go to building 31,000 new affordable homes nationwide?"

a) Is this something you like the sounds of? (separate from technical concerns or privacy concerns, assume those are dealt with)

b) Would you vote every day?

Comments

[c9.livejournal.com]

Ahh, now that example is something else indeed. You *are* properly informed on that issue. So it comes down to:

1. Should you be allowed to vote down support despite the detrimental effect it will have on society in general?
2. Should someone else be allowed to vote down support because they don't *know* the detrimental effect it will have on society in general?

As for the "decisions born out of ignorance" angle: some might say your civic responsibility is to educate your neighbours about the issues, to lobby for the outcome you prefer.

Finally: equal education does not mean similar opinions. What happens when everybody knows the same facts, but still votes against what you want?

[skaughty.livejournal.com]

Answer to #1: If you can 'demonstrate' that you are aware of these consequences, then yes. (of course, hindsight is 20/20, so it is impossible to know the real consequences until well after the fact).
Answer to #2: In an ideal world, no. But I've been looking around, and much to my chagrin it doesn't appear to be ideal. :/

Decisions born out of ignorance: enlightened debate is, I think, the ideal for which we strive; with that in place, and with every voter partaking, direct eDemocracy is theoretically achievable.

Education vs. opinion: then you are in the minority, and become subject to the realities of democratic rule; perhaps the biggest problem with this model is not having a political figure-head on which to pin your discontent; then there's always the issue of 'unequal' education: not everyone has the same access to educational opportunities; if an 'awareness test' were applied, how could it be administered in a fair and un-heavy-handed manner so as to accommodate the full spectrum of informational abilities?

oy-veh