How can I convince people that their vote DOES matter?

Tell them to shut their nagging faces the next couple of years if policies don’t fall their way.
Don’t vote, don’t nag.

Higher turnout makes our democracy more representative.
To the voters go the spoils.
The margin of victory can be important.
Even a vote for a third party can have an impact.

**Voting is a right generations of Americans struggled to win ― and people in other countries are still fighting for.**
For more: https://ivn.us/2014/09/26/50-reasons-why-you-should-vote/

PS I will admit that I don’t have much respect for people who don’t vote. We don’t have that many rights left to us at this point, so why give one up voluntarily. I chastised my own sisters for not voting. Apathy is the killer of democracy. Great question!

@rebbel Insulting them is not going to encourage them to vote. It will just shut them down.

@KNOWITALL I finally got my son to register. Bernie got a LOT of people to register. But when he lost the nomination many of those people just threw in the towel in frustration. My son didn’t vote at all. I’m pretty sure he is going to vote come November, though. He’s a smart man.

I hope the blue wave turns into a tidal wave. That will convince people that their vote does count and it does work.

@Dutchess_III Good job!! Yes, you’ll possibly get your blue wave if you add legalization of MJ to the platform like Bernie…lol

One thing we all can do (regardless of party!), and I have done several times, is get voter registration cards and stand at a grocery store or other local stop, and give out registration cards. All they have to do is fill them out and mail in. It’s a very easy way to help others see the importance of voting, and helps support our democracy and costs nothing but your time.

Once I told a young non-voter that if he wanted a bunch of old rich white guys making all the rules, he should continue not to vote. That got him….lol

Oh, good idea! I’ll call my local office. They should the cards.

I’m stealing your argument BTW.

Well tell them if you want to take the wind out of Trump’s lies they should get out and vote.
GOD help us all if the Rep/cons don’t go down in this mid term.

.

@Dutchess_III Yay, I love that! Yes, maybe your city hall or courthouse.

Try to get the mail in kind, since the others are long form. The easier the better to get people to actually mail them in.

I respect you for the effort, honestly, lots of people talk the talk but don’t actually do anything at all to help motivate people.

Steal away sister, it worked for me!

@notnotnot Best answer yet! haha

Show links to times that an election went down to one vote.

You can’t, and besides we are better off if fewer people vote. They don’t care to learn about the candidates and their positions and are much more likely to use some obtuse and visceral criteria to choose who to vote for so all they do is skew the votes, usually in the wrong direction.

@SQUEEKY2 Their problem is not that they think it won’t make a difference. The problem is they think their one vote won’t make a difference…and the election proved it to them.

Actualy, @rojo, I have two people teetering on the fence, slowly becoming convinced.

@Dutchess Too bad they arent on the site, we could group debate with them! What are the biggest onjections? It doesnt count?

I have no idea what works to convince people that their vote matters. It seems one has to converse with them continuously and no doubt it’s a process that will take time, tact and logical insights on how to pull it off.

They feel the system is rigged so that no matter what they vote for, some other secret power is going to really decide who will win @KNOWITALL. As I said, for some, the most recent election proves that.

@Dutchess_III So the electoral college is the ‘rigged system’....gotcha.

Or that is the one that the Russian’s rigged?

While it may have been a necessity two hundred plus years ago, not any longer. Not rigged but a system whose time has come and gone. We have the technology to make it obsolete.

@KNOWITALL They don’t understand the Electoral College. I have a hard time with it myself. I think that they think some secret deep throat government entity is pulling the strings. I don’t think they attach it to the Electoral College…however, if you think of it, that would be the easiest thing in the whole process to manipulate.

I agree with @rojo. Its time is done.

@RedDeerGuy1 I could show them an election that came down to one vote but they’d just point out that Clinton won by almost 3 million votes…but still lost.

Whoever is intent on convincing people to vote, one has to be knowledgeable enough to be objective in explaining in detail particular issues that concerns that voter.

Rigged, electoral colleges etc etc…if one is not able to explain with enough credibility why such things exists then convincing someone to vote would be ineffective.

One has to study and research, whatever it takes to understand and explain why the electoral college is needed. Or not needed. Why does it exist in the first place? All explanations both simple and complicated need to be understood.

Citizens could not count on their leaders to explain these things to them. Anyone who takes the time and effort to convincing people to vote is a hero in my book.

I am not be a genius when it comes to politics, but I have two people listening to me and they’re starting to waver. For some folks, plain old peer pressure is enough. And, also, if they become convinced that the majority are doing this, that is also enough.

@Dutchess_III That’s what gets me tbh, people don’t seem to understand that Democracy by definition is “a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.”

Unless you were a landowner and white, you weren’t allowed to vote. I always thought it didn’t matter when I was younger, that my participation didn’t matter, and then I grew up. I realized that women were beat down for wanting a say, or marching for the right to vote. Same with black people, put in chains and called animals, and they spread the rumors about them being unable to have intelligent thoughts.

Not only have I voted ever since, but I ran for office to help change things for the better in my little corner of the world. Maybe some of it is unimportant, but some of it isn’t. When I’m up there telling the council members how the poor people deserve to live in buildings that aren’t falling apart, or getting a park put in on the other side of town for the ‘poor kids’.....I mean we can all make a difference somehow, even if it’s taking five minutes to vote.

If there’s no change they want to see, if the world is PERFECT right now in their eyes, then maybe they shouldn’t bother to vote. But if they see things they want changed, then they have to participate and help the rest of us change it.

I feel really passionate about this if you haven’t noticed. :)

I agree. I’ve voted in every election since Carter. I watched they Hippies getting beaten for trying to get the voting age reduced to 18. We could send them off to war at 18 but they don’t get to help decide who is going to send them off to die?
That’s what brought home to me the importance to vote.
I do bring up the fact that people have died fighting for this right. I stop short of calling them selfish assholes for have been given that right and not using it.