Undecided Voters: Why?
I don't get it.
At the apex of the information age, how can you be undecided? I know it's not fair for me to say this because politics and news happens to be my interest and for some people it's baseball. But, with only a couple weeks to go, to still be undecided just doesn't sit right with me. How could you not know?
*points to one of the raised hands*
--Well sir, I reckon I don't think much about such things. Politician's gonna lie to you one way or 'nuther, and ya never can tell who's right or what, so I figure I might as well just keep to myself about it.
*points to another raised hand*
--Uhm, well, like, it's really boring. Like, who cares, you know? One old guy just says the other is wrong, and I'm like, hello, you could have said that in less than like, 10 minutes.
*points to another raised hand*
--It's impossible for me to decide, because it's just a decision between which person will turn the heat up on the frog in the proverbial pot, the frog being America, the fastest. On the one hand, a vote for McCain is a vote for the revolution that will be necessary after his policies destroy the county while a vote for Obama is just business as usual, like FDR, enacting regulations that saved capitalism from itself. They both spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations and I have proof in my Zine that they both pledged to institute the Amero as the currency of the New American Union. They're also both left handed, which indicates their acceptance into the-
I'm sorry, I need to get to another undecided voter. We'll get back to you if we have more time. *points to another raised hand*
--Oh, why am I an undecided voter? I don't know, I have to wait for my husband to tell me.
*points to another raised hand*
--It's a hard choice. Obama is cool, but he wants universal health care, and that's just socialism! And McCain is a maverick, but he probably won't get us out of Iraq.
hmmm...
Yeah, the New Yorker described the "undecided" as the "low information voters," who are generally older and have never been very interested in politics. To be sure, I think there's a good deal of young people who are too cynical to care, as well as a number of young people who simply don't care because they think there's no way that politics has an impact on them. But the undecideds are generally people who would rather read a John Grisham novel or watch Heroes than read "boring" analysis of speeches filled with rhetoric.
My girlfriend's little brother is a smart little guy (internship at Intel), but has been one of those young people who just doesn't care and wouldn't know who to vote for even if he was old enough (he's 17). That ambivalence was tested recently when White Rabbit, a candy he loves, gives to all his friends, and eats at least one of every other day, was found to be one of the products from China containing melanin, a plastic that was used to give things a "milky" taste. Did he make the connection between the revelation that he'd been ingesting plastic without his knowledge and our trade policy? Did he stop to think that maybe he should support people who would be willing to tell China that we will hold their products to the same standards that we hold ours?
My mom, bless her heart, votes for whoever her party tells her to but stays out of it as much as possible. She says she can't tell the fact from fiction and isn't comfortable exploring a world of such gray areas and differences of opinion. She's not a low information person by any means, but she's certainly a "low information voter," someone who doesn't concern themselves with all the information that's out there. She's got Source Overload and doesn't know where to start on most issues except the one she really cares about.
To be clear, "Low information" isn't an euphemism for "dumb," as much as it is a more polite version of "ignorant." Surely, there shouldn't be so much of a negative connotation with the word, since everyone's ignorant of something. I don't know much about cars, baseball, football, basketball, mathematics, most sciences, most areas of literature, the history of many countries, or how to take care of my finances. So I don't fault people for not being interested in something, even though I consider it something that is of vital importance. Those people I interviewed aren't dumb, they just don't really care, and everyone has to make tough decisions about the kind of person they want to be and the kinds of things they want to care about, using an unconscious and emotional cost vs. benefit analysis.
So it's not dumb, but it is bad. And I want it to stop. Every time I hear about an undecided, I want to reach out to them and ask them to read. These people will say things like, "well, I think Obama's universal health care system sounds good in theory but I think socialism won't work in this country. Though I don't trust Republicans any more, at least he's a maverick." And that's why it's predicted that a majority of the undecideds will go for McCain by 70%. Voters who will vote for him because he'll be tough on Russia despite the fact that he hangs out with the shady state-sponsored oligarch Oleg Deripaska and Itallian Mafioso Raffaello Follieri.
One of the things I'm most looking forward to in an Obama administration is the ability to fight with him for a drastically decreased military presence around the world. One of the things I'm not looking forward to with McCain is the fact that I'll have to fight for the ability to fight for anything. His "bipartisan" and "maverick" image is almost completely marketing; he can be charming and agreeable... depending on who's watching, like in one of my favorite BBC documentaries when he roundly criticizes the administration's handling of the war but then a week later reassured Americans that the war would pay for itself and that it's our duty to support the President.
Undecideds, "low information voters," won't swing the election to McCain. Obama has already won, since even if every undecided voter votes McCain, Obama still has more people who are enthusiastic supporters. But this is one of the most important elections of all time and the most important election of our generation, so it's surprising to find any undecideds at all. More than that, it's distressing to think of how many people, even during a historic election, just don't care about the democratic process and being in control of the fate of their democracy.
As if people didn't die for it. As if it wasn't the only thing that makes America great even when she's at her worst.
Edit: here's a related video.
At the apex of the information age, how can you be undecided? I know it's not fair for me to say this because politics and news happens to be my interest and for some people it's baseball. But, with only a couple weeks to go, to still be undecided just doesn't sit right with me. How could you not know?
*points to one of the raised hands*
--Well sir, I reckon I don't think much about such things. Politician's gonna lie to you one way or 'nuther, and ya never can tell who's right or what, so I figure I might as well just keep to myself about it.
*points to another raised hand*
--Uhm, well, like, it's really boring. Like, who cares, you know? One old guy just says the other is wrong, and I'm like, hello, you could have said that in less than like, 10 minutes.
*points to another raised hand*
--It's impossible for me to decide, because it's just a decision between which person will turn the heat up on the frog in the proverbial pot, the frog being America, the fastest. On the one hand, a vote for McCain is a vote for the revolution that will be necessary after his policies destroy the county while a vote for Obama is just business as usual, like FDR, enacting regulations that saved capitalism from itself. They both spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations and I have proof in my Zine that they both pledged to institute the Amero as the currency of the New American Union. They're also both left handed, which indicates their acceptance into the-
I'm sorry, I need to get to another undecided voter. We'll get back to you if we have more time. *points to another raised hand*
--Oh, why am I an undecided voter? I don't know, I have to wait for my husband to tell me.
*points to another raised hand*
--It's a hard choice. Obama is cool, but he wants universal health care, and that's just socialism! And McCain is a maverick, but he probably won't get us out of Iraq.
hmmm...
Yeah, the New Yorker described the "undecided" as the "low information voters," who are generally older and have never been very interested in politics. To be sure, I think there's a good deal of young people who are too cynical to care, as well as a number of young people who simply don't care because they think there's no way that politics has an impact on them. But the undecideds are generally people who would rather read a John Grisham novel or watch Heroes than read "boring" analysis of speeches filled with rhetoric.
My girlfriend's little brother is a smart little guy (internship at Intel), but has been one of those young people who just doesn't care and wouldn't know who to vote for even if he was old enough (he's 17). That ambivalence was tested recently when White Rabbit, a candy he loves, gives to all his friends, and eats at least one of every other day, was found to be one of the products from China containing melanin, a plastic that was used to give things a "milky" taste. Did he make the connection between the revelation that he'd been ingesting plastic without his knowledge and our trade policy? Did he stop to think that maybe he should support people who would be willing to tell China that we will hold their products to the same standards that we hold ours?
My mom, bless her heart, votes for whoever her party tells her to but stays out of it as much as possible. She says she can't tell the fact from fiction and isn't comfortable exploring a world of such gray areas and differences of opinion. She's not a low information person by any means, but she's certainly a "low information voter," someone who doesn't concern themselves with all the information that's out there. She's got Source Overload and doesn't know where to start on most issues except the one she really cares about.
To be clear, "Low information" isn't an euphemism for "dumb," as much as it is a more polite version of "ignorant." Surely, there shouldn't be so much of a negative connotation with the word, since everyone's ignorant of something. I don't know much about cars, baseball, football, basketball, mathematics, most sciences, most areas of literature, the history of many countries, or how to take care of my finances. So I don't fault people for not being interested in something, even though I consider it something that is of vital importance. Those people I interviewed aren't dumb, they just don't really care, and everyone has to make tough decisions about the kind of person they want to be and the kinds of things they want to care about, using an unconscious and emotional cost vs. benefit analysis.
So it's not dumb, but it is bad. And I want it to stop. Every time I hear about an undecided, I want to reach out to them and ask them to read. These people will say things like, "well, I think Obama's universal health care system sounds good in theory but I think socialism won't work in this country. Though I don't trust Republicans any more, at least he's a maverick." And that's why it's predicted that a majority of the undecideds will go for McCain by 70%. Voters who will vote for him because he'll be tough on Russia despite the fact that he hangs out with the shady state-sponsored oligarch Oleg Deripaska and Itallian Mafioso Raffaello Follieri.
One of the things I'm most looking forward to in an Obama administration is the ability to fight with him for a drastically decreased military presence around the world. One of the things I'm not looking forward to with McCain is the fact that I'll have to fight for the ability to fight for anything. His "bipartisan" and "maverick" image is almost completely marketing; he can be charming and agreeable... depending on who's watching, like in one of my favorite BBC documentaries when he roundly criticizes the administration's handling of the war but then a week later reassured Americans that the war would pay for itself and that it's our duty to support the President.
Undecideds, "low information voters," won't swing the election to McCain. Obama has already won, since even if every undecided voter votes McCain, Obama still has more people who are enthusiastic supporters. But this is one of the most important elections of all time and the most important election of our generation, so it's surprising to find any undecideds at all. More than that, it's distressing to think of how many people, even during a historic election, just don't care about the democratic process and being in control of the fate of their democracy.
As if people didn't die for it. As if it wasn't the only thing that makes America great even when she's at her worst.
Edit: here's a related video.
Click to view