this post was submitted on 21 Nov 2023
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I suppose it'll continue until enough people believe that it's possible for a third party to win.
I think ranked choice voting would make it much simpler to foment that change. People need to be able to trust that breaking from the party line has a real chance of success, but that can't happen without demonstrating support.
If we can't have real ranked choice voting, a third party could build a website to let people coordinate votes according to ranked choice, and hopefully carry the result as a unified bloc to the polls. Have an agreement that if a certain threshold of participation is met, vote for the ranked choice result. Otherwise, lesser of 2 evils.
The first-past-the-post vote counting all but guarantees a two-party system, but the thing is, it doesn't have to be the same two parties that we're used to. If it did, we'd still have Whigs. If coordination of masses of people online works, we could just replace one of the two parties outright.
Perhaps. In theory, you're definitely right. I just feel that this is something where building the momentum during a single election cycle isn't feasible. The most likely result of voting for a third party without laying this groundwork would be splitting the vote and giving a landslide victory to the greater of the two evils.
Formally organising online would make it possible to demonstrate how much support each candidate actually has without giving an official vote to a candidate that the general public isn't confident enough to vote for. Watching participation grow and third parties receive substantial semi-official support could build excitement and lead to a third party being trusted to have the sway to win.
I'd love to be proven wrong though. If we can organize enough support for a third party within a single election cycle that it's reasonable to risk voting for that candidate, I'm open to it. I already have too much on my plate, but if no one has built this service by the time I have energy for it, I'll definitely be thinking about it