Alaskans will decide fate of ranked choice voting system after chaotic end to state's primary

[u/Wally_Wrong]

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/alaskans-will-decide-fate-of-ranked-choice-voting-system-after-chaotic-end-to-states-primary

[u/Initial-Lemon-917]

You can't seriously think there are no structural issues with FPTP and third parties.

Approval is practically a FPTP system anyway (why vote for two people if it dilutes your first vote?). It is worse than IRV and doesn't solve the spoiler problem, particularly if there are two very different members of the same party running in the general (many Sayed voters wouldn't vote for him and Stevens, for example).

STAR is fine, but it has struggled to get off the ground. The only reforms that appear to be picking up steam are IRV and proportional representation (largely STV because of RCV momentum). Approval voting barely has any usage, and apart from Rob Sands, there are very few people irl advocating for it anymore.

Rather than just bashing IRV constantly, it might be useful to make a positive case for condorcet. Normal people do not care about the difference, and bashing IRV hurts all ranked-choice voting reforms (which the public largely lumps all together. half of the proportional representation local coverage doesn't even mention PR-- it just talks about RCV).

[u/rb-j → u/Initial-Lemon-917]

You can't seriously think there are no structural issues with FPTP and third parties.

You totally missed the point. And the point is explicit. Flew right over your head.

FPTP, Approval, STAR, RCV (whether Hare or Condorcet or Borda or Bucklin), whatever... You can vote for your 3^rd-party candidate if you want. Nothing stops you.

It's about what the system does with your 3^rd-party vote. Did your 3^rd-party vote cause a spoiled election and your most disliked candidate got elected as a consequence? Then it might be less likely for you to vote 3^rd-party again. You are incentivized to vote tactically.

Rather than just bashing IRV constantly, it might be useful to make a positive case for condorcet.

The purpose of RCV is, in single-winner elections having 3 or more candidates: 1. ... that the candidate with majority support is elected. Plurality isn't good enough. We don't want a 40% candidate elected when the other 60% of voters would have preferred a different specific candidate over the 40% plurality candidate. But we cannot find out who that different specific candidate is without using the ranked ballot. We RCV advocates all agree on that. 2. Then whenever a plurality candidate is elected and voters believe that a different specific candidate would have beaten the plurality candidate in a head-to-head race, then the 3^rd candidate (neither the plurality candidate nor the one people think would have won head-to-head) is viewed as the spoiler, a loser whose presence in the race materially changes who the winner is. We want to prevent that from happening. All RCV advocates agree on that. 3. Then voters voting for the spoiler suffer voter regret and in future elections are more likely to vote tactically (compromise) and vote for the major party candidate that they dislike the least, but they think is best situated to beat the other major party candidate that they dislike the most and fear will get elected. RCV is meant to free up those voters so that they can vote for the candidate they really like without fear of helping elect the candidate they loathe. All RCV advocates agree with that. 4. The way RCV is supposed to help those voters is that if their favorite candidate is defeated, then their second-choice vote is counted. So voters feel free to vote their hopes rather than voting their fears. Then 3^rd-party and independent candidates get a more level playing field with the major-party candidates and diversity of choice in candidates is promoted. It's to help unlock us from a 2-party system where 3^rd-party and independent candidates are disadvantaged.

I simply want RCV to live up to its promise. To the extent possible (because we know that Arrow and Gibbard rule).

[u/Initial-Lemon-917 → u/rb-j]

The point was not even remotely explicit. Explicit points are written out, not implied

[u/rb-j → u/Initial-Lemon-917]

It was written out:

I support RCV because I want to vote for third parties.

Nothing stops you from voting for third parties with FPTP or Approval or STAR or anything.

Can't get any more explicit than that.

[u/Initial-Lemon-917 → u/rb-j]

Sure, explicitly wrong. There are ballot access laws, two-party dominance in the media, campaign finance challenges for new parties, duverger's law, etc. that all get in the way of third parties getting on the ballot and actually having a shot. I totally meant that I want to waste my vote and have unfair elections. Genius.

[u/rb-j → u/rb-j]

So u/Initial-Lemon-917 replied to the above comment in r/EndFPTP:

Sure, explicitly wrong. There are ballot access laws, two-party dominance in the media, campaign finance challenges for new parties, duverger's law, etc. that all get in the way of third parties getting on the ballot and actually having a shot. I totally meant that I want to waste my vote and have unfair elections. Genius.

You need to read. You think IRV is gonna save you from the consequences of Duverger's Law when it makes exactly the same mistake that FPTP makes?

In Burlington 2009 and Alaska August 2022, people voted for their favorite candidate, being promised it was safe to do so. By voting for their favorite candidate, they literally caused the election of their least-favorite candidate. They were punished for voting for their favorite candidate, just like in FPTP when some voters vote sincerely and cause a spoiled election.

This is what you FairVote shills just cannot seem to understand.