Should Americans have to pass a test to vote?

I know its not a new question, but it something I figured I'll bring up again. There is so much talk about the tyranny of the majority, but what about the tyranny of the stupid? The voting process can help vet candidates to ensure they are qualified, but only if the voters have some semblance of intelligence and rational perspectives. Does it make sense that some Californian drop-out pot head or a superstitious farmhand have equal power to an educated individual?

I think about American society and how everything must be delivered into 1 minute sound bytes, even complex issues. Also, the bogeyman syndrome is another example of the simplicity of the American mind. They need to put face on something, to channel their energies to it. Recent examples of this are Osama Bin Laden, George W Bush, Greedy Bankers and now Obama. Americans seem to need a figure head, not just for the rallying effect, but maybe because their minds arent capable of dealing with the broader perspective of things.

I dont know the perfect solution, but people accept that needing to take a driving test before one get a license is considered a public safety issue, so why cant the stupid voters be in the same way and viewed as a threat to public safety?

I don't think so, everyone has the right to vote on who their leader is..

No, it's a right........I have to ask though, since you seem to only make and contribute to your own political threads, why don't you just join a political forum?

My teacher thinks there should be a basic intelligence test first.:P

Absolutely not - the propensity for abuse would be astronomical.

My teacher thinks there should be a basic intelligence test first.:P

dercoo

Who makes that test? And there in lies the problem. Any way, it's a right to vote.

Plus, the right wingers would go nuts when the tea party guys can't pass. :lol:

No. It's an inalienable right given to all adult Americans.

[QUOTE="dercoo"]

My teacher thinks there should be a basic intelligence test first.:P

SgtKevali

Who makes that test? And there in lies the problem. Any way, it's a right to vote.

Plus, the right wingers would go nuts when the tea party guys can't pass. :lol:

And i'm sure the Left Wingers would go nuts when half their party or more fails..

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

[QUOTE="dercoo"]

My teacher thinks there should be a basic intelligence test first.:P

Xx_Hopeless_xX

Who makes that test? And there in lies the problem. Any way, it's a right to vote.

Plus, the right wingers would go nuts when the tea party guys can't pass. :lol:

And i'm sure the Left Wingers would go nuts when half their party or more fails..

Calm down, I was partially kidding. Well, not really. Whatever. Have you seen the Tea Party guys?

It would be great if we had a test that filtered out the uninformed voters from the ones capable of making informed voting decisions. Unfortunately, this can never happen in reality because whoever was in power at the time would probably design the test such that people with particular political viewpoints would never pass, or use it to keep out ethnicities like the literacy tests used in the South used to do back before we banned those.

And anyway, this is the kind of bs that was used against blacks in the South.

wow this is so wrong on so many levels i dont even know where to start

Nah, there should be no test. It's why we have the Electoral College anyways. Rheiken

True, but candidates still have to campaign and appeal to the lowest common denominator. Campaigns are won more by speaking ability then real, articulate, detailed ideas. The few smart ones have to put aside their faculties if they want to win or stay in power.

As for abuse, well the status qua is too destructive and is getting worse. The world was alot more simpler back 200 years ago, but now its infinitely more complex and decisions have major ramifications on a global scale. Elections shouldn't be won by pandering and grotesque "get out the vote" campaigns, which are essentially bribing people who dontknow anything or has ever voted to vote for someone.

yes. cuz some ppl are stupid these days

So every other voter in the world is well informed and well educated? Must only be americans that have people that aren't up on the issues. Or do you presume to tell us that anyone with a point other than yours is stupid?

Make a 5th grade level test of general knowledge not specific knowledge if the person passes it then at least we know they are as intelligent as a 5th grader.

No, because suffrage is a right. O_O

Make a 5th grade level test of general knowledge not specific knowledge if the person passes it then at least we know they are as intelligent as a 5th grader.

dracos9000

You don't get it, do you? Tests to vote are what they used to do in the South to discriminate against blacks.

No, because suffrage is a right. O_O

gamerguru100

EDIT : no why did you have to edit your post ??

For a democracy to work, the people need to be able to make educated decisions and votes. Without proper education and knowledge of current events, you can't make an informed decision. Having a test to determine if a voter is competent enough is the wrong way of approaching the problem is incompetent voters though. For one thing, an intelligence test isn't enough; you can be intelligent but uninformed about current events. If you test for knowledge of current events, who is to say if their knowledge and understanding of current events is sufficient? Who do we give this power too? The potential for abuse is evident. Besides that, a test ignores the problem; it is a band-aid not a solution. To fix incompetent voters, we need better education and more accurate and through coverage of current events. bededog

The problem isn't as simple as "we need better news sources". We could have better news sources and they actually do exist. The problem is that the average person simply isn't interested in real news. They want gossip about celebrities, news about TV shows, movies, and music. Any political news that they do watch has to be entertaining too. There has to be an element of conflict (war, intense political diatribes) or gossip (political mis-steps, slip of the tongues, etc). Not only that, but real news has to be delivered in bite-sized portions because the average person quickly gets bored (hence why all the 24/7 news channels have news tickers and summaries of the current story on the screen).

In other words, the problem isn't necessarily the news sources but rather the market. People don't want news, they want entertainment. News companies realize this and in an attempt to be as profitable as possible they cater to that large demographic. The reason Fox News is so successful isn't because it's a good place to get news, it's because they picked a demographic and exploited it by giving the people exactly what they wanted (a news channel that confirms all their pre-existing political biases and beliefs). 24/7 news channels have so many pundits not necessarily because they need something to fill up the time slots with but because those pundits are what get the channels their highest ratings (lots of conflict and lots of gossip-like talking).

To give you an idea of just how anti-news people are, my political science professor back in my American Politics class told the story of how a cable TV provider decided that instead of cutting off non-paying customers' service entirely they would just replace every channel with C-SPAN. The results of this little experiment were that a far greater percentage of people paid their bills, and not just that but they paid them faster.

[QUOTE="Rheiken"]Nah, there should be no test. It's why we have the Electoral College anyways. majwill24

True, but candidates still have to campaign and appeal to the lowest common denominator. Campaigns are won more by speaking ability then real, articulate, detailed ideas. The few smart ones have to put aside their faculties if they want to win or stay in power.

As for abuse, well the status qua is too destructive and is getting worse. The world was alot more simpler back 200 years ago, but now its infinitely more complex and decisions have major ramifications on a global scale. Elections shouldn't be won by pandering and grotesque "get out the vote" campaigns, which are essentially bribing people who dontknow anything or has ever voted to vote for someone.

We live in a representative democracy, deal with it. The government represents the people, even if it's the "lowest common denominator" people.

Yeah... and the first question should be "in what country was Jesus born?".

How can people think that it is a bad idea? It is a great idea.

[QUOTE="gamerguru100"]

No, because suffrage is a right. O_O

Nonstop-Madness

EDIT : no why did you have to edit your post ??

with voter turnout seeming to decrease every election, why would you make it so even fewer people vote

I don't know about that, but I do know that I can't help but find it odd that immigrants are required to know basic facts about America before they can vote whereas natural-born Americans are not.

I don't know about that, but I do know that I can't help but find it odd that immigrants are required to know basic facts about America before they can vote whereas natural-born Americans are not.

GabuEx

They're taught in school, aren't they? :roll:

I know its not a new question, but it something I figured I'll bring up again. There is so much talk about the tyranny of the majority, but what about the tyranny of the stupid? The voting process can help vet candidates to ensure they are qualified, but only if the voters have some semblance of intelligence and rational perspectives. Does it make sense that some Californian drop-out pot head or a superstitious farmhand have equal power to an educated individual?

I think about American society and how everything must be delivered into 1 minute sound bytes, even complex issues. Also, the bogeyman syndrome is another example of the simplicity of the American mind. They need to put face on something, to channel their energies to it. Recent examples of this are Osama Bin Laden, George W Bush, Greedy Bankers and now Obama. Americans seem to need a figure head, not just for the rallying effect, but maybe because their minds arent capable of dealing with the broader perspective of things.

I dont know the perfect solution, but people accept that needing to take a driving test before one get a license is considered a public safety issue, so why cant the stupid voters be in the same way and viewed as a threat to public safety?

majwill24

Drop out potheads need representation too.

I don't know about that, but I do know that I can't help but find it odd that immigrants are required to know basic facts about America before they can vote whereas natural-born Americans are not.

GabuEx

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

I don't know about that, but I do know that I can't help but find it odd that immigrants are required to know basic facts about America before they can vote whereas natural-born Americans are not.

SgtKevali

They're taught in school, aren't they? :roll:

Sure they're taught in school, but no one asks if they actually learned it before they vote.

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

I don't know about that, but I do know that I can't help but find it odd that immigrants are required to know basic facts about America before they can vote whereas natural-born Americans are not.

GabuEx

They're taught in school, aren't they? :roll:

Sure they're taught in school, but no one asks if they actually learned it before they vote.

It's assumed you already know this stuff because you grew up in country, as opposed to the immigrants who didn't.

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

They're taught in school, aren't they? :roll:

SgtKevali

Sure they're taught in school, but no one asks if they actually learned it before they vote.

It's assumed you already know this stuff because you grew up in country, as opposed to the immigrants who didn't.

Sure it's assumed. But is that assumption actually correct?

Immigrants have to prove they know that stuff. Americans do not. That is all.

[QUOTE="bededog"]For a democracy to work, the people need to be able to make educated decisions and votes. Without proper education and knowledge of current events, you can't make an informed decision. Having a test to determine if a voter is competent enough is the wrong way of approaching the problem is incompetent voters though. For one thing, an intelligence test isn't enough; you can be intelligent but uninformed about current events. If you test for knowledge of current events, who is to say if their knowledge and understanding of current events is sufficient? Who do we give this power too? The potential for abuse is evident. Besides that, a test ignores the problem; it is a band-aid not a solution. To fix incompetent voters, we need better education and more accurate and through coverage of current events. gameguy6700

The problem isn't as simple as "we need better news sources". We could have better news sources and they actually do exist. The problem is that the average person simply isn't interested in real news. They want gossip about celebrities, news about TV shows, movies, and music. Any political news that they do watch has to be entertaining too. There has to be an element of conflict (war, intense political diatribes) or gossip (political mis-steps, slip of the tongues, etc). Not only that, but real news has to be delivered in bite-sized portions because the average person quickly gets bored (hence why all the 24/7 news channels have news tickers and summaries of the current story on the screen).

In other words, the problem isn't necessarily the news sources but rather the market. People don't want news, they want entertainment. News companies realize this and in an attempt to be as profitable as possible they cater to that large demographic. The reason Fox News is so successful isn't because it's a good place to get news, it's because they picked a demographic and exploited it by giving the people exactly what they wanted (a news channel that confirms all their pre-existing political biases and beliefs). 24/7 news channels have so many pundits not necessarily because they need something to fill up the time slots with but because those pundits are what get the channels their highest ratings (lots of conflict and lots of gossip-like talking).

To give you an idea of just how anti-news people are, my political science professor back in my American Politics class told the story of how a cable TV provider decided that instead of cutting off non-paying customers' service entirely they would just replace every channel with C-SPAN. The results of this little experiment were that a far greater percentage of people paid their bills, and not just that but they paid them faster.

I absolutely agree about the fundamental problems with Americans and the "living in the fast lane" ethos they live by and the need for overall better education. However improving the basic knowledge and the cognitive ability to analyze and link things is a great feet, but would be necessary for your top down solution to work, otherwise viewers wouldn't understand it and therefore not trust what they hear.

The idea of a yearly civics test, something that would be thorough and require a written essay done at testing location would be an intermediate solution tostop the harm that the ignorant masses continue to inflict on others. I'm sure many wouldn't even bother and those that do, a few would probably fail. eventually the disenfranchised would become upset and make efforts to educate themselves. It wont take years, just taking an hour or two out of the day and reading a book would go a long way.

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

Sure they're taught in school, but no one asks if they actually learned it before they vote.

GabuEx

It's assumed you already know this stuff because you grew up in country, as opposed to the immigrants who didn't.

Sure it's assumed. But is that assumption actually correct?

Immigrants have to prove they know that stuff. Americans do not. That is all.

I don't know about you, but I took a lot of tests in school.

I'd rather have restrictions on campaign content. You know, to avoid misinformation, lies, etc. in campaign ads and whatnot. Lockedge

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

It's assumed you already know this stuff because you grew up in country, as opposed to the immigrants who didn't.

SgtKevali

Sure it's assumed. But is that assumption actually correct?

Immigrants have to prove they know that stuff. Americans do not. That is all.

I don't know about you, but I took a lot of tests in school.

Nothing that you are saying is disputing the fact that at no point in time is it verified that natural-born American citizens actually learned the stuff that immigrants are tested on before being allowed to vote.

[QUOTE="SgtKevali"]

[QUOTE="GabuEx"]

Sure it's assumed. But is that assumption actually correct?

Immigrants have to prove they know that stuff. Americans do not. That is all.

GabuEx

I don't know about you, but I took a lot of tests in school.

Nothing that you are saying is disputing the fact that at no point in time is it verified that natural-born American citizens actually learned the stuff that immigrants are tested on before being allowed to vote.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure immigrants are asked these questions to become naturalized, not to vote. But correct me if I'm mistaken.

I'd rather have restrictions on campaign content. You know, to avoid misinformation, lies, etc. in campaign ads and whatnot. Lockedge

That would be far more difficult and once again would be pandering to the lowest denominator. I support restriction on misinformation, but many times proposals and policies are intentionally ambiguous for flexibility purposes.