Re: Electoral Obligations

Writes Spencer Morgan:

Saying that you have an obligation to vote and that doing so is the way to advance liberty is like saying that you should join your local street gang, go through their initiations, rise through the ranks and become their leader just so you can reduce its level of violence. Most people would reject an assertion of such an obligation to be ridiculous. The moral scenario regarding government and voting is the same thing.

You wouldn’t be making it less of a street gang in that example, and no amount of voting or particular uses thereof will change what government is. Votes also will not change its inherent and perpetual tendency to abuse liberty. Just as with the street gang, I’d prefer to not participate and deny the presumption of sanction and credibility that my doing so conveys.