Ten Terrible Reason to not Vote (and two good ones) 

“People in debt become hopeless and hopeless people don’t vote. They always say that that everyone should vote but I think that if the poor in Britain or the United States turned out and voted for people that represented their interests there would be a real democratic revolution.” -- Tony Benn

As an unmarried, non land-owning female, even though I can sometimes be disillusioned about the process - I vote on the sheer principle. Several of my family members served in the military and less than 100 years ago several women dedicated their entire lives to getting the vote for those who were denied the right. It's my part. It's the least I can do.

vote cthulu 2016. He may be the greater of two evils, but at least you know where he stands.

Please god do *not* vote if you don't have a good understanding of who or what you're voting on. Too many people do too little research and vote anyway. And it's OK to leave your ballot mostly empty because you don't only have an informed opinion about a few of the issues/positions.

I think it's quite sad, Hank, all the negative comments on this video - not of people who think different, but people who are simply jaded, or tired, or hopeless. It is a rather similar thing with people in my country (Colombia); and perhaps the greatest threat to democracy is apathy. It is quite ironic, that of almost 200 years of fighting for equal representation, in some many different countries with such different ideologies, people are actually saying by their inaction that they don't want to have a say in how things are run. I do not know if they don't want to think about it, or don't want the responsability, or simply feel that "political things" affect them in any way... but it is very, very sad. Sorry for the sad post - but hurray for all of you who vote and inform yourselves, wherever you are in the world.

Some issues I have with this video 1) The 1% does have way more impact on elections, but it's not because they vote more than the rest of the 99%. The rich make significant financial donations for politicians who steer the direction of the government in the rich people's favor. In an ideal clone of the US, frequency and kind of laws passed would match the countrymen's interest, but in our world, a bill has about a third of a chance of being passed regardless of interest in the matter. The 1%, however, have a much more significant 61% chance of getting a bill passed in their interests due to their financial power enabling them to hire lobbyists, buy politicians, and smother opposition in media. CNN ran a poll after the Democratic Debate over which candidate won the debate, with Bernie Sanders taking a strong lead over Hillary Clinton. CNN, a major contributor to Hillary's campaign, removed the poll from the website and reported her triumph over Sanders all over media, despite her having much squishier answers to prompts and refusing to talk about the Black Lives Matter movement, while Sanders pushed for things the common people want. 2) The United Sates of America is not a democracy, or it would be called that in every text book in the world. It is a republic. Citizens' votes individually do not matter, nor do they directly affect elections. They are suggestions to elected representatives at the town, county, state, and federal level. While Americans can elect these representatives, it is all too easy for them to become corrupt.

I'm sick of all these pretentious people telling me to vote. It's so easy to sit on your horse and claim that all people who don't vote are slackers and are disengaged. That is a fallacy that both liberals and conservatives have bought in to. Hey liberals, with the fight against ISIS, which side are you on? ISIS' side or Assad's side? What? You want to opt out and let the region deal with the problems? It's almost as if you were never presented a real choice to begin with and you are simply not playing the game. Our voting system is completely fucked up and the people that parrot the "get out and vote" don't actually understand our political system. Because if you did understand how ineffective our voting system has become, you'd realize how un-sophisticated your "voting matters" chants sound. Maybe if we took the money out of politics, more people would vote and be less dissuaded by the rhetoric. Maybe if we got rid of First Past the Post conditions, our representatives would be more...representative of the population Maybe if we got rid of the electoral college, we'd get a better president that's for the people instead of a president that's for the flyover states Maybe if we got rid of gerrymandering, incumbents would be more responsive to the constituents Maybe if we adopted the Alternative vote or something that got rid of the need for strategic voting, 3rd party candidates would have an actual chance. Maybe if we made voting as easy as paying your cell phone bill, more people would vote. You can't change a single one of these problems with voting. Pretty much the only way to fix any of these problems is a revolution. If you want to take to the streets, I'm game, let me get my shoes. Become a leader, don't just keep spouting propaganda. To claim that there is never a reason to NOT vote is like saying there's no government so corrupt that will twist the rules any way they can to maintain the status quo. That's historically false and gives the impression that any country that let's its people write a name on a fucking piece of paper is obviously a democracy.

As a 14 year old I cannot wait until am old enough to vote. I won't make excuses because no excuse is good enough for me not to vote, because I know it is a great privilege that some people in the world don't even have. Yes our system isn't perfect, but it's better than other countries and I'm grateful for that. I just hope young people won't continue to make excuses not to vote.

"My vote won't matter" May I introduce you to the Sorites paradox. You have a heap of sand. Removing an individual grain does not make it into a none heap. Therefore if this is repeated you are left with a single grain. Is a grain a heap? Or do heaps not exist? If the mass of votes is important, and removing your vote does not diminish the importance then eventually you will be reduced to a single vote in which case either all votes are important or importance does not matter.

Under 18 and I wish I could switch places with anybody not voting.

I'm not American, but I think from an outsider's perspective (Australian) the most illogical and irrational thing in the democracy of America is the electoral college system for electing the president. While I understand at least in theory how this operates, the fact that it is ultimately a one shot - win the state, win all the votes from that state - rather than a representative proportion of votes per state seems ridiculous to me. Furthermore, I think the greatest arbitrary psychological barrier to people voting is how long (and I'm talking presidential race here) it goes for. Candidates from each side spend an entire trying to prove why their own party's other candidates are lying sacks of shit before they go on to face the other side's lying sacks of shit in the contest for all of the bananas. This lengthy process also leads to the prevalence of money in politics, and the big donations from big corporations that leads to the perception (and almost certainly reality) that politicians are bought and owned by the rich. Yes it is all well and good Hank to say that everyone has one vote, but Citizens United squashed the idea that everyone has access to the same freedom of speech. And... furthermore... who came up with the idea of holding elections on a tuesday? In Australia we hold elections on saturdays, because most people aren't working (although this is changing), and it isn't a pain in the arse to go and vote some place.

I say my vote doesn't matter, in the sense of the electoral college being the deciding thigng... But i still vote

If you're in a red state, and you vote democrat...you might as well have not voted at all. The Electoral College is what makes a lot of us feel like our votes don't matter much, in these situations.. they really don't. If someone can win the Popular vote but lose the presidential race because of the the Electoral College .. That can make you feel like your vote is worthless, unless you're in a swing state. Also, this is the main reason you don't see many political ads unless you are in a swing state, even the system knows our individual votes don't add up to much.

Proud to say I am 18 and voted the first chance I got.

'if you don't vote you can't complain about the results ' - my social studies teacher on election day

Sorry, it doesn't matter... Politicians only do the bidding of their donor, if you look at the laws and etc that they put into place ONLY favor the rich. Sorry.

I've been living in this country since I was 4. I've always been very passionate about the things that need to change. I'm 18 now, I live in Texas, Gregg Abbott is about to elected governor and as an immigrant and a student I strongly disagree with his views, and I can't vote because I'm not a citizen. So even though I love this country and I've been living here for nearly 80% of my life, I have no voice and my opinion doesn't matter. The only thing worse than being a second class citizen is not being a citizen.

You didn't really answer the "lesser of two evils" thing right. It's like someone is telling me whether I want to vote to have some of my rights taken away, or more of my rights taken away. If I want neither, why can't I vote for neither?

“I think democracy is the most revolutionary thing in the world….because if you have power you use it to meet the needs of you and your community.” --Tony Benn

I always vote because one of the only memories I have of my great grandmother was her telling me and my sister to always vote, because she was around when women couldn't vote and helped to fight for it so that her daughters and granddaughters will be able to enjoy that right. Can't very well say no to that!

I absolutely love how fired up Hank is in this video...so much love for this

Who you vote for is irrelevant; politicians pass legislation according to the cash put into their pockets by the corporate lobbies, not according to the desires of the people they represent. Discuss.

just turned 18 and damn I do not want to deal with this shit but I can't sit here and not do anything about it.

As a guy doing a degree in politics & considering a masters in electoral theory, I have a few problems with this video, most of which are highlighted by other comments, but what the hell: There are inherent problems with the electoral system employed by the UK & the USA. There are many strong arguments for majoritarian systems, but no-one can say they are absolutely perfect. In the last general election in the UK, if you remove votes for a candidate that lost, and remove excess votes that a candidate didn't need to beat their competitors, then only 28% of the vote in the UK directly attributed to a candidate getting a seat. My constituency is one of the strongest labour safe seats, and when the same MPs & councillors have been in power for multiple decades, it becomes easy to see why people feel that their vote is an acceptance of a system they don't agree with. If you don't agree with the electoral system, voting re-enforces the mandate of a system you dont want. In that instance, it is better to not vote, and to get politically active in other ways, such as joining pressure groups etc... Also, when people say that only the rich have power in elections, they DEFINITELY don't mean direct power through voting. its indirect power through all sorts of legal & illegal measures which are incredibly widespread. This kind of stuff can't just be explained away flippantly. I want to re-iterate that a lot of the reasons people have for not voting are bad, and if people dont vote because they dont know how etc... thats not good enough. However, there are very reasonable reasons to not vote.

I don't vote anymore, because the people I vote for are controlled by big companies, lobbyists and so on. I know there are some people in Congress for example, that actually are looking out for us. But on the example of a supportive bill on local (organic) farming in the states a vote would never go through, because the people voting are supported in millions and millions by the big agricultural companies. So I choose to vote indirectly by making the choices in my life that I think are right. Fot example supporting local farmers cause they are the ones that actually produce what is yummy and dense in nutritional value. I feel better that way.

Also if you think that you're voting for the lesser of two evils, try voting third party for a change. Sure, your candidate probably won't win, but showing your support for a third party candidate can help to eventually legitimize alternate parties and turn the US away from a two-party system.

I like the push to get people to vote, but you missed two very BIG reasons why some people don't vote or have trouble voting. 1. Gerrymandering has caused my vote to literally do nothing in a local election in my area. No amount of votership in my area, even 100%, will matter when I was artificially made into an very tiny minority. 2. For the presidency, the candidate that I really want to support is a 3rd, or godforbid, 4th party candidate. Due to the electoral college, our two party system is both inevitable and unbreakable. If I vote for who I want, I'd probably be hurting the lesser of two evils. But if I don't vote for who I want, I'm not actually making my true voice heard. So what do you do? Put these two reasons on top of being someone who needs to use an absentee ballot and I can tell you why I sure as hell don't vote. If you can counter both of these arguments convincingly AND make absentee ballot voting easier, then by all means. Try and convince me.

"If you're not voting, no one is hearing your voice" What if there is no option that will represent me? Seriously, no one running in an election here is actually going to represent someone like me, and many other folks.

Hank, this is one of the very, very few comments I'm leaving on RU-vid. And I think it is going to be rather lengthy. I'm an 30yr old Egyptian guy who lived through the Egyptian revolution and the coup backed by the people. I used to vote even before the revolution in 2011 under the same beliefs that you have mentioned in the video. And when I asked people to vote I heard similar answers. Now, after the current "president", who is working vigorously to eliminate any political space or activity in Egypt, and has delayed the parliamentary elections so many times it seems to require us to take a time machine to reach them, and has made the people vote on a constitution that he transformed into toilet paper not-surprisingly (civilians get jailed without charge and get military trials, civilians in North Sinai are being deported out.of their homes under the belly of national security and are not compensated for their losses - that's just to mention stuff off the top of.my head), now voting in our country actually seems fruitless and in some cases risky. Cuz in some voting stations the organizers can intrude to see your vote and report you if you vote against state, since we live under a totalitarian state using democracy a make up. And even after we vote here in Egypt, we know for sure that we live in a lawless military run country that has the utmost disdain for civilians and humans in Egypt in general. What I'm trying to say, when I hear about people in the usa not voting, my blood boils and think that whoever is not voting is basically not appreciating the blessing you guys are having. We lived through losing friends and loved ones being killed on the streets beside us and being jailed for no f***ing reason just to get the right to vote and for us to matter here; and for the right to a better future, and we lost it. I think you should tell people to go vote or else they will end up being completely screwed, use us and other totalitarian authoritarian countries as an example. Sorry for this long comment and I really could hardly hold back all the cursing I had in mind, because this is a big deal that you can actually make a difference peacefully and without bribery or pulling strings that you don't have. If anyone doesn't want to vote, I'd trade passports with them instantly so they can live in a country that doesn't want them to vote and I'll live in the usa and promise you that I'll vote on every singe ballot, law, referendum, election or even beauty contest that allows me to vote.

I don't want to vote for the lesser of two evils because the lesser of two evils is still evil! How is that hard to understand? I want to vote for someone who will represent me best, not for someone who won't represent me, but a little better. If the two party choices are awful, I'll vote for a 3rd party. And if everyone who felt the same did just that instead of feeling it was a waste of their vote, a third party candidate could actually have a chance.

I'm 20 and I just voted for the first time for my city's municipal election. The mayoral candiate I voted for didn't get in, but I still feel like I made a good choice. I researched the platforms for the mayoral candidates, the counselors, and the school board trustees. Literally no one I voted for got in, and finding information about the trustees was actually hell in a handbasket. But I think there's something to be said for personal satisfaction in knowing you did what you could. I did everything I could to vote for the people I thought would be best for the job. I think that's important. (I'm not American, but I think you might know a bit about Toronto's mayor - or ex-mayor now, Rob Ford... his brother was running for mayor, as well as another conservative candidate, and then a more liberal one. The other conservative candidate got in, so the politics aren't much different, but the hope is that we won't get into American news anymore bc that's hella embarassing)

The United States definitely is not a democracy because democracy is really mob rule. We are a representative republic with the individual rights of its citizens held in very high regard. That aside: I vote. I love voting. They give you little stickers, and they even give me extra stickers that say "I voted" which I put on the children to really confuse people. It is a shame that more people don't do their homework before they vote. We do have a right to vote, and such rights have some responsibility attacked to them. You really should know what you're voting for or against.

Thank you Hank, I needed this. I was not looking forward to voting, but now I'm kind of psyched up for it. Thanks again :)

I am a Canadian living in the US. And from what I can see... Yes the voting can make a difference on who you vote for, but since it's now legal to corrupt politicians with approximately unlimited money, well, the big corporations are doing it ... on everybody. And politicians seems to focus more on raising money for their campaign than actually deciding anything. Nobody seems to have any convictions, and the few that do are being shut-down by the giant mass of politicians who wants nothing to change.

Some actual reasons not to always vote. *1.* Your vote, however significant it might be said to be, is garanteed to drown in a sea of other votes. *2.* The only differences between to political parties and candidates are minor things compared to what we're supposed to be discussing. All political candidates share the same fundamental ideology. *3.* Positions of power have a tendency to decrease the ability of those inhabiting them to empathise with the people "below" them. This is a documented fact, both through sociological and neurological studies. *4.* It is entirely unpractical to elect people to make economic decisions for the entire nation, or even smaller parts of it. Political representatives cannot know all the details required to make informed decisions over specific areas. The only ones who do are the combined intellects of the people inhabiting these areas. The only effecient mehod of governing is direct democratic federalism. *5.* By voting you are legitimising this ineffecient and undemocratic structure. *6.* Elections are massively affected by the propaganda released by either political party or candidate. Links have been drawn between the most successful political candidates and the ones with the greatest monetary backing. I'm not saying that we should never vote. I'm saying that voting is not the most important political action you can perform. If you should choose between trying to affect the system through voting or through activism with its basis in civil ddisobediance and direct action, choose the latter. Organise, agitate, demonstrate, strike, et.c.

Hank, you're wrong about two things. First, our country is NOT a democracy. It's a Democratic Republic. Democracies directly elect their leaders. Republics elect people to elect their leaders. Our country is a mix of the two. We vote directly for the Senate and Congress, but not for the President. That means our country is not a democracy. Second, there are times when your vote doesn't matter. Case in point. 2000 elections. Florida was contested. We all heard about hanging chads. Every vote was counted and recounted. Court cases took place. Seems like that would indicate your vote counts. Unfortunately, the same exact thing was going on in Utah at the time. But, Utah didn't have enough electorates to swing the election either way. If Florida went to Gore and Utah to Bush, Gore would win. If Florida went to Bush and Utah went to Gore, Bush would win. Literally, not a single vote in the state of Utah mattered that day. Not one. The 2000 elections also support my first statement that we're not a democracy. When you look at the democratic vote of that election, Gore was the clear winner. More people who went to the poles said they wanted Gore to be president. But we're not a true democracy, so the election went to Bush. I want to stress that I'm not saying one candidate in that election is better than the other. Nor am I saying that you're wrong about the need to vote. People should go out and vote. If they don't, they can't complain.

I am now 18+2 months,and alI got registered. Vote: all that is required for idiots and bad politicians to get elected is for sensible people to do nothing.

If you think a single person can't make a change, just look at the P4A or the recent Water.org fundraiser. I donated $5 because that's what I had. It's not much, but when thousands of other Nerdfighters did the same, we raised hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Another good reason not to vote is being uninformed. This is close to not caring, except that a lot of people feel it's their American duty to vote whether they're informed or not. I was pressured by my family to vote the first time I was able, even though I knew I didn't know enough about the issues.

This is, hands down, the worst comment section I've ever seen on a Vlogbrothers video. Either that, or the broken comment system just happened to make it look that way. Turning my ballot in on Monday. Great video, Hank.

You know... Whilst I live in Australia, these are still all valid reasons to vote! Voting is compulsory here, but the amount of people who either just pay the fine they get, or cast a "Donkey Vote" (ie. voting for Mickey Mouse or something) is amazing! Add to that people who don't enroll because they "can't be bothered" is staggering... I regularly hear complaints about "How did that D&$khead, Tony Abbott get elected?" but when I query them, their response is either "I didn't vote..." or "I'm not enrolled..." The reason that people like this make it past the public and into office is due to the huge numbers who just simply don't use the voice they're given!

I'm 19, and I'm not voting this year. I just moved to a different state, and I'm currently involved in the biggest project of my life. These two factors have combined to make it so that I a) know absolutely nothing about the political climate, candidates, or issues on the ballot in my new state and b) am working all day every day on this project (2:15 a.m. and I just stopped to unwind a little bit). Additionally, I have a disability so I have to go to the polls with someone, or request accommodations in advance. I feel really bad about not voting, I feel like I am letting down my younger self who ranted and raged and even sometimes cried about not being able to vote... but this year, right now, I just can't swing it and I don't want to vote without really understanding the political climate of my new state.

If voting is what makes the people we elect pay attention to us, then why do they usually pay so much MORE attention to the people who give them the most money? The obvious truth is that politicians don't care at all about the people who elect them, except to the extent that said politicians find it necessary to manipulate a sufficient number of voters to get themselves into office. And then they proceed to ignore the voters who elected them while lying about the fact that they do it. So I understand why people don't vote. But I'm voting anyway.

The fact that I will be able to vote in 2016 doesn't scare me, it's that my classmates will be able to vote in 2016. I'm also not completely politically aware at the moment. But for the love of god, PLEASE, someone start a public works program.

Ahhhhh this is why I love Australia. We don't have a choice in whether or not we vote. We have to vote once we turn 18 or we get fined. If we have to do it, we may as well change the sucky stuff.

I would vote if there was "none of the above" option.

You should of made it clear between voting for a president where your vote really doesn't matter, and voting for other positions. Now before you go all crazy on me I will explain why your vote doesn't matter for president. It does not matter because of (electoral votes). Each state has a number of electoral votes they can award, and ONE person decides who they go to in a presidential election. Even say here in Kentucky where If the majority votes for the democrat, but the one who controls the electoral votes loves them some Republicans. Then they can go against the majority, and give Kentucky's electoral votes to the Republican. The person who controls those electoral votes chooses weather to listen to the majority, or do whatever the hell they want, and we can't control that until the election where we can replace him or her.

Both "You voted. You accept the system. You have no right to complain over the result." and "if you don't vote. You lose the right to hitch [bitch]" commit the naturalistic fallacy, unless I am mistaken. Also, "People in the US died for the right to vote." is both naturalistic fallacy and Ad ignominiam (appeal to shame).

I'm a Canadian so this video wasn't technically for me, but I wanted to say that our electorate is experiencing the same problems. We had an election just over a week ago: HALF of eligible voters showed, and that was a RECORD HIGH. Once the media reported that the inner-city, left-of-centre candidates were consistently polled as our future government, the aging suburban class mobilised in droves and voted for the only right-of-centre candidate in the running. In three days, we went from a left-of-centre, diversity-championing female mayor, to a blue-bleeding, corporate copyright lawyer and right-wing unknown that has no campaign message for anyone other than WASPs. tl;dr: Each and every vote does matter, so **please vote!**

I encourage citizens to vote in most local elections and for local initiatives, but currently I refuse to vote for congresspeople and the President because it is statistically demonstrable that they ignore the opinions of the general public, and there is no indication that voting changes this. When things like corporate personhood, unlimited contribution limits ( or limits that only rich people can afford to reach), and lobbying in general become not a thing, then I'll revisit it. Rich people and corporations through unfettered campaign donations basically pick who we get to choose between because in general only candidates who are good at fund raising become front runners. Voting for the "lesser of two evils" is a tacit acknowledgement that the system is broken and also that you don't care to take a stand to fix it, you're willingly participating in something you know is broken. The only hope is that we make our voices heard at the local level and hope it trickles upward. But history has shown that even seemingly honest politicians go to Washington and get bought.

Lastly, it's the people who vote who have no right to complain. They either voted in the person/party who fucked things up or they tacitly endorsed it by accepting the rules, that if your guy wins, he's in, and if your guy loses, the other guy wins. You're playing by the rules of the game. You have no right to complain if it doesn't turn out the way you want. I don't like the rules of the game, I think they are stupid, corrupt, unethical, and antithetical to progress. I have every right to complain because the rules stink.

Voting is not an obligation and shouldn't be viewed as such.

I can't believe you don't have compulsory voting! Like yes I do get annoyed at people who don't understand or care about what they're voting for, but for the most part it forces people who would otherwise be apathetic to get involved in our democracy!

Dear Hank, Yesterday I wasn't planning on voting because I didn't care too much on the things being voted on. So during this video I was really impressed that you admitted that if you don't care, that is a completely acceptable reason not to vote. I've always believed that, and I think a lot of those who try to convince others to vote don't acknowledge this or don't believe that is a good enough reason. Since you are understanding enough to believe that not caring is a good enough reason, I decided that I could be understanding enough to understand how much you want people to vote and to care. So I did some research, and went and voted (it took surprisingly little time) yesterday. Credit goes to you. Keep up the good work, thanks, and I'll see you on Friday.

Yep, I'm sharing this with everyone I know. Also, with everyone I don't know. Basically, I'm just going to jam this video in the eye balls of every human I see. That should do it. -Nathan

I'm not in America (I'm from England) but I turn 18 just before the next general election (May 2015, I think) and I have _no_ idea how to research who to vote for? I don't even know anything about the differences between individual parties or the history of their reliability or anything like that. Basically seeing as we learn absolutely nothing in school about the government or anything we're voting for, I know nothing, and don't know where to access reliable information.

I was an election judge for two elections and get sooo dumbfounded when people say they dont vote bc "it doesnt count" (particularly for presidential) or some other thing so I love that you made this video !!!!!!!!!!!

2:23 "Do you know how many democracies were there in the world in 1900?" Both New Zealand and South Australia were self-governing British colonies, and both had women's suffrage before 1900. New Zealand in 1893 and South Australia in 1895. (Australia as a whole established women's suffrage in 1902 after becoming a fully independent nation state.)

No reference to Halloween at all? I'm a little disappointed. Also, isn't the US technically not a democracy, but a republic? It's a democratic republic, but it's still a republic.

I don't think that not caring is a good reason not to vote because politics is EVERYWHERE. Care about the amount of taxes, condition of your roads, anything about education, health care, how much food costs, etc., etc.? Then you should care about elections!

Woo hoo! Give 'em hell, Hank! We need every young person in this country to get out there and vote!

Let me start by saying that I'm definitely voting, I think it's important. My problem is that I don't want to vote without being informed, and I definitely don't want to vote based on party alone. But everytime I try to do research on the candidate all I find is political crap that explains nothing of value to me. It's frustrating. I want a site I could go to and read about all the topical issues in an understandable way. Because, I mean, I'm fairly smart, I guess, but a lot of the information is hard to understand. Does anyone have advice on how to learn about the issues?

Here's another tip. If you live in a state that is mostly a party you disagree with, register for that party. Vote in the primaries for someone moderate in that party. A Democrat is never going to win Texas, and a Republican is never going to win California. This mainly applies to presidential elections because of the electoral college. (CGP Grey made a great video on why the electoral college is stupid.)

I watched this while eating a packet of salt & vinegar Hula Hoops.

Does the presidential election even matter that much in america? I mean, anything he/she tries to put through can get turned down by the congress... And congress can also make laws...

As for the rich thing: they win elections because they can easily sway other people's opinions. If you're not swayed by them, then WHY THE HELL WOULDN'T YOU VOTE?

Well done Hank. Though you missed the excuse that pisses me off the most "I'm a third party, so I'd just be throwing my vote away anyway." No you won't, because if more people show there is actual support for third parties we could see some reform in the system properly allow for more than the two party system. Also it's not inherently throwing away your vote, because while no president has been a third party (technically, barring like the Whigs) we've had numerous third party congressmen, governors, and even a handful of senators.

I love this so much. I love Hank's optimism in everything, especially the optimism he brings to social issues. People will get bogged down by restrictive voter ID laws and negative campaigning but nope; Hank looks to the bright side of things.

***** - as a History teacher & patriotic American (I care about the country I live in - am not blindly okay with the way it has or will function) I love this video. Thank you for being you & passionately expressing that apathy is not a default way to exist. For this Halloween I opted to come in costume but as Lucy Burns (American Suffragette that faced harsh societal punishment for advocating to change society) I included a list of hints as to who I was and offered extra-credit to students that figured it out. Keep being Awesome & know that if there were an election that you were running in - my vote would be for you!

It seems insane to me that in the US, you really only have two parties/presidential candidates to choose between that actually have a chance of winning. In my country, there are five or six major parties with four of them having a large enough following to be in with the chance of winning an election. There are also dozens of smaller parties and many independents. And my country is A LOT smaller than the US, so logically should have fewer major parties.

Don't millionaires basically decide the pool of electable candidates, by funding their campaigns? I can't just vote for whoever I think would be the best person. I have to choose from candidates who had the support of people with enough money to make significant donations. btw, i'm just pointing out a descriptive oversight - i don't think this is a good reason not to vote.

one thing most people forget, if you have really good reasons to vote for none of the things that are an option. Go vote, but don't tick anything of this way you at least make a political statement compared to note voting at all, because then people will assume you just don't care.

Your two evils commentary was perhaps the single stupidest thing you've ever said on youtube. You should be encouraging people to vote for third parties. But instead, you're encouraging them to support the establishment.

Although I agree with many points in this video it doesn't acknowledge many other reasons young people can't vote such as voter ID laws and placement/hours of polling centers are often in place to keep the young, poor, and people of color away. The video also makes it seem as if voting is the only way to get your voice heard completely ignoring only ways major change has ever come about in this country such as direct action, journalism, and grassroots organizing. To say that people who don't vote "don't care" is just ignorance of the actual things people are doing to make real change.

Just being able to see a feature being filmed would actually be the best thing ever tbh. Especially for Paper towns which is one of my favorite books, like, ever.

I don't vote, and it's not for any of the mentioned reasons. The trouble I have is that politics doesn't make sense to me. I don't see the chain of logic that allows my vote to be converted into positive change in the world. This goes beyond "I don't understand the issues." Even if I grant the (frankly preposterous) idea that half an hour of surfing the internet could get me up to speed enough about a complex situation potentially touching on a variety of disciples and concerns that I would feel confident in rendering a binding arbitration on it, I then have to trust that the political system itself will deliver the result I intend. This requires me to trust upwards of hundreds of politicians (whom I don't know personally, and many of whom are career egotists) as well as the bureaucracy itself. What if one measure going forward would cause an uprising of support for its opposition, resulting in a much greater period of time before other necessary co-measures could go through than if we waited until the next election cycle? What if one candidate who seems like a good bet gives the contract for their measure to a company owned by a friend, who happens to be less scrupulous? What if the candidate is straight-up lying (and happens to be good enough at it that half an hour of internet research isn't sufficient to figure it out)? No, there are too many places where things could go wrong, even disastrously so. Maybe some people have the ability to parse through all those fail gates, to see the order behind the apparent chaos, but to me, voting looks like trying to swordfight with an open bag of packing peanuts. As such, I leave the whole shebang to those who might have a better handle on it. We don't demand everyone understand mechanical engineer enough to build a car, quantum physics enough to write a dissertation, or fiction writing enough to write a best-selling novel, and we don't demand that everyone be able to dance, design a building, fly a fighter jet, code an operating system, run an industrial farm, or teach Shakespeare to 12th graders, even though all those things are important to society in their own ways. To me, voting effectively appears to have a comparable level of complexity, and it's simply not a form of madness that makes sense to me. So please, leave me to my madnesses and I'll leave you to yours. Specialization is beautiful and it's what has allowed humanity to rise above.

On "the lesser of two evils"... the act of not voting for anybody for a position is helpful in that it shows that the person who gets elected is not actually supported by very many people.

I've recently given myself a new rule to live by: I don't get to complain about something unless I try to change that thing at least once... I also hold my friends and family to this rule, but it would be exhausting to hold the internet to this rule so I won't... but consider it? It's made me a lot happier and I've been able to initiate a lot of good change.

While I do think it's important for everyone to vote, I have to say this but America is not a democracy, It's a constitutional republic. The founding fathers didn't want america to be democracy simply because they believed it would be disastrous.

I'm not even American and this video was really interesting

After the 2020 election in my state in GA being as close as all 3 of the elections in my state were, it has come to my attention that my does matter. Many states like mine have always gone with the popular vote.

I could catch you on a real technicality on the "it's not a democracy," because technically it's not, it's a republic. We don't all vote on every single decision, that would be ridiculously silly, we select people to represent us in the decision making process.

My rule is if you don't vote you have no right to complain about how the government is running the country.

Another reason not to vote is if you don't know which option would be better/worse. A democracy can fail hard if the people voting are really stupid or ignorant of all the facts/details.

I think the biggest problem that I have with this is that the abstain vote is not counted as a valuable vote. I'm not too lazy to vote, that's an absurd generalization made by people that value their vote over the opinions of others. A decision to not vote, is a vote. I simply abstain because I do not find value in the available choices or believe that those choices are both wrong. When you say you are voting for "the lesser of two evils" you are consciously recognizing the fact that all of your options are the wrong choice and you are still supporting one of them - logic be damned. You don't have to, that is not the way the system was meant to work. If you don't feel represented, then voting for the wrong option anyway doesn't do anything except create a political ecosystem that doesn't adequately represent any one individually and therefor fails to represent the citizen body as a whole...just like we have now. No one is happy with our political leadership or the way things are done. No one likes the fact that government committees or courts entrusted with hearing GMO arguments are headed by former Monsanto attorneys or that our elected officials are choosing to ignore global warming because they have selected to use their own understanding of science, which is invariably wrong, rather than defer to the consensus of the experts. This is all because voters keep voting them in. The lesser of two evils just eats us - nibble by nibble - rather than huge mouthfuls at a time. You've filled the theater with corrupt souls and then wonder why the place is haunted when it all burns down. "But they were only a little evil", you say. You just filled the halls of congress with concentrated evil an eye dropper at a time. When dedicated voters, who will exercise their right to vote at all costs, need a babysitter to go vote today they will discover that the only choices they have is between a baby-killer and a pedophile, well, I guess the next generation of American Voters is going to have a lot of therapy bills.

This honestly needs to be showed to everybody.

First of all, I am an EU citizen, english is not my mother language and US is not my mother country, so please be patient with me and my poor english... I dont need 10, but will give you 7 good reasons to NOT vote, for you Hank: 1) Votes are an opinion based on each person's beliefs and education, yet none of us knows how to manage a country, voting in such matter is like having a cancer ill patient laying on a bed and having a group of doctors asking everyone how should they treat him in order to save him. 2) Votes are free. Yes, a lot of people died in order to give us democracy, but so did other people following other ideals today considered obsolete, today your vote has a lot of power and value yet what you have to do in order to vote is take a walk and press a button, which takes me to my 3rd point. 3) The "buttons" you are presented with are already filtered by how much a candidate's campaign had success, in order to know your candidates you had to inform yourself, maybe you went on the internet and looked them up, maybe you read a newspaper or maybe you met them during a speech in your city. All of that publicity requires money, and the money comes from sponsors, people that believes or can gain a profit from that candidates politics, so you're left with a set of "buttons" that are there thanks to whoever has the economic power to sponsor them. 4) Our problems today are mostly technical, not political, ask a politician how would he increase production using less energy, geez ask a politician about ANY practical stuff, they would need engineers, architects, scientists, designers, they would need expertise to solve the problems they promised to solve in the first place. I'm not suggesting a technocracy, but a democracy is just as obsolete in this matter. 5) Democracy cares about discussion but fails at decision making, it feeds on divergent ideas, otherwise you wouldn't have as many candidates, that's why they are competing in the first place, but then the one who gets the biggest numbers wins, I don't see how that could be convenient for everyone, this generates a hard to change politics model, where well argued innovation is mostly obscured by old fashioned practices. 6) If you really care for your country (or for the world I should say) then voting is actually the lazy way to do it, as I stated before, is free, you don't have to do much, and you have to agree with the less of two evils at the end. Do you really care about your world? Start thinking how you could change the system that is governing you, with the man and industrial power we have we could end everyone's misery in a blink, yet we prefer to vote, so someone else gets the work done... oh wait... 7) Voting actually counts as a "I'm ok with this decision making model of ours, please, continue with it, as I'm pleased". So if you have anything to say about this method of doing democracy, the best thing you can do is avoid participating in it. In conclusion, democracy in my opinion should carry a participation factor, like paying for a pool at your house or a better car, things arent free and is only then that you give such things value, they should be "payable" with self empowerment will and not money, something like if you're a child then you get to support your cause by studying your guts out 5 hours a day, or if you're a teacher by teaching whatever you know, each one should "pay" with his own effort whatever cause he wants done, and should also pay for the causes that he's against, that would promote positive discussion, where a decision based on facts is most probably to come out (so you don't have to work to avoid things happening and other people wouldn't have to work extra to make them happen) Democracy today is about who has the best language and charisma with a good sponsorship on their backs, I know we can do better, I hope we do... Please don't vote, and be a model for something better...

I don't vote because I'm a liberal, and I live in an extremely conservative location of a conservative state. Thanks to the electoral college my vote in national elections literally doesn't count. Local stuff is even more discouraging since anything/anyone I'd want to vote for would still lose by 2/3 or more of the vote like always.

We are a republic, not a democracy.

In many states (including my state of Kansas), you do NOT have to have any form of dissability or even a good reason to vote absentee. You do have to pay $1.19 return postage and send it in a day before the election so it arrives on time to be counted, but you do NOT have to have any good reason to vote absentee. Once you register to vote, just send in a form a couple weeks/months before the election requesting and absentee ballot. It will arrive in the mail, and you can fill it out at your leisure. I think it's awesome that they've opened absentee ballots to anyone in many states. :)

i am but a classy fedora wearing free thinker who won't be fooled by these silly voting games, nice try, but i am simply to intelligent of a individual too fall for such sheeple behavior! damn i could really go for a wendy's cheeseburger right now

I'm not old enough to vote.

Also you're argument for 99% of millionaires voting isn't very valid. They're mainly concerned with their money so they feel the need to get the right person in office that in alignment with their goals (mainly preservation of capital). They aren't just voting at the ballet, they're giving money throughout the year to politicians who are in line with preserving their capital. They have more to lose thus they are more concerned with the legal system in America. Because 99% of millionaires vote does not give 99% of Americans a reason to vote. Millionaires are roughly 3% of the population, in fact.

VLOG bros is wrong - reason being, there is no real difference between parties. It's two pre-approved choices.

I would like to vote for a candidate that would work towards changing the voting system to a STV (Single transferable vote) system, who should I vote for? (not that it actually matters, since I'm Canadian, and I already know who I'm voting for in my own country, but I would like to see who i WOULD vote for, if I did live in the states :) )

Loving the Narnia map poster Hank! Brings back super awesome childhood memories.

Let's all do our part to help Gary Johnson secure 2% of the votes this election! :D

DFTVA!

It's the crap feeling you get when the person you voted for won't end up getting a position after your troubles, or end up being shit at his/her job, or a liar.

#feelthebern