cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/16451158
this post was submitted on 26 Mar 2026
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Voting is about the lowest form of political influence (besides doing nothing). If all you do is vote then you're left with candidates determined by others. You can (and should) still vote for the least worst option of those that have a chance of winning, because not voting effectively means you approve of all options. The only thing you can vote against in an election where one of two options will win is one of those options, by voting for the other. Anything else won't matter.
If you want better options to vote for, you need to be politically active besides voting, actively working to establish better options, tell the established parties what candidates and policies you want them to support, support smaller parties that represent your interests better, and that might slowly shift it into a direction more to your liking.
Of course that's much harder that doing nothing at all and proudly telling yourself that that will somehow delegitimize the system - the system doesn't care. Election results are shown only as a proportion of valid votes, anyone else has no influence on the result at all.
I thought the US has primaries, in which you can vote.
Primaries are not consistent or even fair in most of the country. Local elections, state elections, and federal elections are all different.
Like in some states it's not a partisan election. Everyone votes across the board. The winners of that primary (almost always the two parties) move on to the General Election. Sometimes it's 2 Democrats for deep blue states and red states will end up with 2 Republicans to choose from. It's extremely convenient for lobbying groups since they just funnel money towards the top candidates irrespective of party or policy.
That's the main mechanism I can relate where the primary system has been compromised. It simply is not an effective option for swathes of the American electorate anymore.