It’s really easy to blame non-voters when you have the privilege of civic literacy
This is a helluva line I that I’m absolutely stuck on.
I don’t even know how to approach it… civic literacy as a privilege? I feel like that’s an entirely new term invented as a way of avoiding accountability tbh. I get that it’s hard to vote, and I get people who have to work all the time, but I don’t get pushback against the idea that we’re just not making the effort or trying to push through challenges for a better future. Fuck that, I don’t care. Ya’ll gonna learn one way or another what accountability means.
Getting a quality education or having parents who did is a privilege. No baby was born knowing how to vote. The vast majority of non-voters don’t even know how to start, let alone how to take time off to vote or when their mail-in ballot window is. Many might not have the required IDs and need to jump through another hoop to vote.
To non-voters, the voting process can be as daunting as getting your driver’s license the first time, except they’re doing it alone, juggling 3 jobs and raising kids. They simply don’t have the time or mental energy to go through bureaucracy and mentally keeping every deadline and paperwork in their minds.
Civic literacy is a privilege because the fact that you understand the importance of voting and know enough about the process to plan ahead of it means that you grew up in circumstances that allowed you to do so.
Calling people lazy for not voting is like calling people assholes for not buying cage-free eggs. t’s very easy to not give a shit about either when you’re living paycheck to paycheck, and it’s very easy to perceive complaints about this as virtue signalling.
You’re not getting anyone to vote by calling them lazy. Don’t be angry. Be useful and be actionable. If you actually want more people to vote, understand the systemic barriers behind why so many don’t vote, educate others on it, and make a difference.
Me who was denied an education and raised by a cult family in the wilderness for the first 20 years, and had to escape and learn everything and get an education on my own, and still somehow managed to learn the importance of voting for qualified candidates, reading this and taking notes
This is a helluva line I that I’m absolutely stuck on.
I don’t even know how to approach it… civic literacy as a privilege? I feel like that’s an entirely new term invented as a way of avoiding accountability tbh. I get that it’s hard to vote, and I get people who have to work all the time, but I don’t get pushback against the idea that we’re just not making the effort or trying to push through challenges for a better future. Fuck that, I don’t care. Ya’ll gonna learn one way or another what accountability means.
Getting a quality education or having parents who did is a privilege. No baby was born knowing how to vote. The vast majority of non-voters don’t even know how to start, let alone how to take time off to vote or when their mail-in ballot window is. Many might not have the required IDs and need to jump through another hoop to vote.
To non-voters, the voting process can be as daunting as getting your driver’s license the first time, except they’re doing it alone, juggling 3 jobs and raising kids. They simply don’t have the time or mental energy to go through bureaucracy and mentally keeping every deadline and paperwork in their minds.
Civic literacy is a privilege because the fact that you understand the importance of voting and know enough about the process to plan ahead of it means that you grew up in circumstances that allowed you to do so.
Calling people lazy for not voting is like calling people assholes for not buying cage-free eggs. t’s very easy to not give a shit about either when you’re living paycheck to paycheck, and it’s very easy to perceive complaints about this as virtue signalling.
You’re not getting anyone to vote by calling them lazy. Don’t be angry. Be useful and be actionable. If you actually want more people to vote, understand the systemic barriers behind why so many don’t vote, educate others on it, and make a difference.
Me who was denied an education and raised by a cult family in the wilderness for the first 20 years, and had to escape and learn everything and get an education on my own, and still somehow managed to learn the importance of voting for qualified candidates, reading this and taking notes