• Jordan Lund@lemmy.one
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    1 year ago

    I would need to see the ballot to say for sure, but the article lists this example:

    “The lawsuit notes that in elections for at-large seats on the DC city council — where voters can currently choose two candidates — voters in Wards 7 and 8 are less likely to cast a second vote, a phenomenon known as “undervoting.””

    So, when presented with a relatively simple “Vote For Two” choice, Ward 7 and 8 are less likely to vote for a second person.

    If that’s a problem, then the idea of not only voting for multiple people, but ranking them 1-2-3, may be a big issue.

    Remember, back in 2000 Florida voters struggled with the butterfly ballot.

    But in the end, this could be solved by a combination of education, clear instructions, and an easy to understand ballot design.

    • Zaktor@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      But undervoting isn’t really a problem. No one is being disenfranchised by not casting a second vote (or ranking all options), they just aren’t availing themselves of the full range of options. Even just voting for one person could be an intentional choice if you don’t really care about the other options or want your first choice to have a better chance of winning an expected head-to-head.

      This is at worst an indicator the government should run some informational campaigns, not a reason not to use multi-voting systems.

    • catreadingabook@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I get this in theory but it gave me the hilarious mental image of someone gathering their phone, keys, wallet, going to their local polling station, showing their ID, walking to the voting machine, then thinking, “Oh no, I’m allowed to vote for TWO people?” and immediately bolting out the door.

    • AfricanExpansionist@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      It’s a design and execution problem, not a voter problem. The Florida ballots had a stupid design that met the needs of a counting machine, not the needs of voters

      • Jordan Lund@lemmy.one
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        1 year ago

        Pretty sure it was less about the machine snd more about intentionally confusing older voters to pull votes from Gore and add them to Buchanan…

    • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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      1 year ago

      Maybe the second candidate was s*** and nobody wanted to vote for them? Or maybe voters really only wanted the one person.

      • Jordan Lund@lemmy.one
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        1 year ago

        Or, and I think this is more likely, people are used to the idea of marking more than one name invalidating the ballot.

        • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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          1 year ago

          You think that’s more likely huh? But somehow only in those two heavily minority districts? What are you basing that on?

          • Jordan Lund@lemmy.one
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            1 year ago

            I don’t think it’s just in those minority districts. The article states that it’s WORSE in those districts, that doesn’t mean it’s not a problem elsewhere.

            Maybe they need to put “Vote for Two” in bold or a bigger font or something. Like I said at the top, it’s hard to tell without seeing the ballot design.