"Poland has a law called “election silence”. It makes it illegal for anyone currently residing within Poland to do any kind of political campaigning on Election Day or the day before. This includes making speeches, putting up posters, airing political commercials, even public posts on social media, though not private conversations or messages in non-public groups. If there's also a referendum that is only valid when a big enough quorum of voters is present, you're not even allowed to encourage people to vote, as that can impact the referendum results. This law supposedly exists to give voters a chance to make their decisions in peace, without constantly being bombarded with propaganda from all sides. Many people (often from opposing political factions) claim that the law is outdated and should be repealed, but it doesn't seem to favor one particular side over any other, so nothing has been done about it so far."
Many countries (such as, say, France) have similar laws. Sounds okay to me. So what's the issue here?
FWIW, as a Briton-turned-American, it’s always struck me as very bizarre how they start announcing results on the east coast here, while people on the west coast (not to mention Hawaii and Alaska!) are still voting. Surely it affects results?
The practice of the media predicting results based on exit polls and then everyone just treating them as if they're authoritative is equally bizarre.
IMHO there's a lot of little and big things that feel quite bizarre about US democracy when compared to most others. A consequence of being both the first-ish and never having a government change.
That’s just a variation of the effects of mass market elections.
If you only vote for president? There’s no reason to go to the polls in the majority of states.
The problems even worse in Australia where voting is mandatory with a fine but if you’re in Western Australia you could be “forced” to vote in an already concluded election.
The argument I've heard from some US-Americans supporting the practice is that it's not the same election - i.e. you aren't electing Joe Biden, you are electing members of the electoral college for state XXX.
I think it's mostly "Look at this weird Polish thing". It's funny, it's local and it pops out during last few election, so probably someone decided to share this cultural phenomena, because of the timing.
In Spain it's called "jornada de reflexión" (deliberation day), and there also are Twitter accounts sneakily announcing surveys and provisional results.
It seems an inevitable collision of the election silence laws which were intended for broadcast media and party campaigns being applied to Internet social media.
> Many countries (such as, say, France) have similar laws.
The Indian version is called the Model Code of Conduct and it is enforced by the Election Commission of India.[1] The ECI even takes control of the bureaucratic and law and order machinery in the period leading up to the elections.
> So what's the issue here?
Typical left wing complaints about anything and everything in countries where they don't see a chance of returning to power by electoral means. If the people are not voting for them, it is obviously because the ruling party and their supporters are fascists. There can be no other reason.
These narratives are built and spread using their control of media. Their friends in the Global Left help amplify the message.
Saying that media outlets are in the hands of "the global Left" borders on the delirious.
Especially when one of the chief complaints about the democratic backsliding in Poland and Hungary is precisely the encroachment on freedom of press (together with the erosion of the separation of powers).
I'd go even further and ban ALL political advertising.
Politicians should have a page on the electoral commission's website, like a university professor's page on the university website.
People can type in their postcode on the website, see who's on the ballot and look at their policies, then vote on the date.
No campaigning. No advertising. No flyers. No social media. Nothing.
Randomise the position on the ballot.
If people go to the polls on the day with no idea who to vote for, it will be a better outcome than people having been manipulated with big money through aggressive media campaigns to vote one way or the other.
Alternative suggestion: allow ads, but all spending goes to a shared pool which is split equally between all candidates. If candidate A collected $1M and candidate B collected $500k, they both get $750k to buy ads and they can place them only in evenly and randomly distributed fashion. The ad can only say "Vote for XXX, find more at (www)/(phone)", so the ads serve only the purpose of discoverability of the candidate program.
I'll be honest, I've been tempted by this idea before. But it really feels like "engineers navel-gaze solutions to social problems".
At the bare least, there are valid reasons to vote for someone beyond what they say on their policy statement. And social media and campaigning allows them to engage with voters and answer questions. And without a least a bit of the election circus I wonder how many people will disengage with the process, causing elections to lose legitimacy and be decided by a small number of zealous party loyalists.
I'm not arguing for a blanket ban but please elaborate why I need to see a poster by a local candidate on every 2nd tree on the road I take.
Maybe it would help if the laws were stricter that they need to take them down sooner after the election or are not allowed to put them up so much earlier, but still.
The social problem for me is that I am forced to look at xenophobic right-wing propaganda when going outside. Or just plain lies "we did a thing" by the ruling party, where thing is 100% provably not true, but because of weasel words they are allowed to do this.
And I find this idea to be great. Now, why would someone that wants to be re-elected go and shoot themselves on the foot?
Keep in mind that majority of politicians do this for a living and some don't even hesitate to jump ship/parties as long as they keep their chairs in committees, etc.
It seems that's been the function of revolutions and coups for
centuries, although occasionally a natural disaster provides the
opportunity.
However, there is another concept from ancient wisdom, designed to
break the inevitable cyclic stick-slip "sawtooth wave" of periodic
violent reset.
It is the "Jubilee" [0]
In modern terms we'd have something like; every generation all
political offices become null and void. Nobody who has been in any
office for more than a year can ever re-enter politics. It would also
be helpful at that point to break up too-large corporations and cancel
debts.
It's like controlled burning.
Much of the misery and stagnation we face today is down to a lack of
planned destruction.
This will not prevent big money from influencing politicians through various means.
Also a lot of the voter influecing is done through almost invisible campaigns such as the "carbon footprint" or neo-liberal content in tv soaps and the like.
In Poland political parties are funded mostly from country's budget (depending on last election results), not from donations. Donations are only allowed from normal people, not from corporations. PAC-s equivalent are rare.
I'm Polish (well, not spending much time in Poland lately), but just FYI this practice (not the election silence - that is true) is not something me or family ever heard about. Maybe it exists, but it's not popular.
The bazarek is fun but in reality even less relevant that this post makes it out to be. Since people with real information cannot prove it and it takes zero effort to post fakes the bazarekposts are not any more meaningful than random guesses. Arguing about them is just a pastime for people waiting for polls to close.
In other countries such as Argentina and Brazil also exists "veda electoral", is this something uncommon? [1]. It has its fundamentals. In Europe you can see this thread [2].
Similar laws exist here in the UK. The results of exit polls in particular can't be announced until after voting has finished, and political news coverage on TV and radio is very limited during the voting period.
Personally I thinks it's a good idea - voting ahould be calm and considered.
Elections should reflect the will of the people. But it's kind of gamed, because
lots of people don't vote. And then it becomes about who has the money, and ground work to get out their voters to vote.
Say you were willing to cheat to have your candidate win the vote. Not uncommon historically through out the world. One way of doing it is to wait for election results, then make up the margin with fake ballots or fraud. This is why the opportunity to cheat is greater if elections take a week to tabulate, as opposed to same day results.
Not knowing the results, and not being able to game the system, even for one day, in theory should more accurately reflect the will of the general population, even the ones that don't vote.
Lots of apathy and people that gave up on politics and dont vote. Yet they don't support the current government. For example they sit out because only able to chose between two terrible or undesirable candidates. Or maybe they feel the political system is rigged, or voting is fake.
There's going to be discrepancy between who wins the voting game, and who the people support.
Sampling Errors, where the method of voting favors only certain demographics would produce such results
Readit News
Many countries (such as, say, France) have similar laws. Sounds okay to me. So what's the issue here?
The practice of the media predicting results based on exit polls and then everyone just treating them as if they're authoritative is equally bizarre.
If you only vote for president? There’s no reason to go to the polls in the majority of states.
The problems even worse in Australia where voting is mandatory with a fine but if you’re in Western Australia you could be “forced” to vote in an already concluded election.
But the incremental results: we have distributed elections. For the people reporting results the election is over.
The Indian version is called the Model Code of Conduct and it is enforced by the Election Commission of India.[1] The ECI even takes control of the bureaucratic and law and order machinery in the period leading up to the elections.
> So what's the issue here?
Typical left wing complaints about anything and everything in countries where they don't see a chance of returning to power by electoral means. If the people are not voting for them, it is obviously because the ruling party and their supporters are fascists. There can be no other reason.
These narratives are built and spread using their control of media. Their friends in the Global Left help amplify the message.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Model_Code_of_Conduct
Especially when one of the chief complaints about the democratic backsliding in Poland and Hungary is precisely the encroachment on freedom of press (together with the erosion of the separation of powers).
Politicians should have a page on the electoral commission's website, like a university professor's page on the university website.
People can type in their postcode on the website, see who's on the ballot and look at their policies, then vote on the date.
No campaigning. No advertising. No flyers. No social media. Nothing.
Randomise the position on the ballot.
If people go to the polls on the day with no idea who to vote for, it will be a better outcome than people having been manipulated with big money through aggressive media campaigns to vote one way or the other.
At the bare least, there are valid reasons to vote for someone beyond what they say on their policy statement. And social media and campaigning allows them to engage with voters and answer questions. And without a least a bit of the election circus I wonder how many people will disengage with the process, causing elections to lose legitimacy and be decided by a small number of zealous party loyalists.
Maybe it would help if the laws were stricter that they need to take them down sooner after the election or are not allowed to put them up so much earlier, but still.
The social problem for me is that I am forced to look at xenophobic right-wing propaganda when going outside. Or just plain lies "we did a thing" by the ruling party, where thing is 100% provably not true, but because of weasel words they are allowed to do this.
Keep in mind that majority of politicians do this for a living and some don't even hesitate to jump ship/parties as long as they keep their chairs in committees, etc.
It seems that's been the function of revolutions and coups for centuries, although occasionally a natural disaster provides the opportunity.
However, there is another concept from ancient wisdom, designed to break the inevitable cyclic stick-slip "sawtooth wave" of periodic violent reset.
It is the "Jubilee" [0]
In modern terms we'd have something like; every generation all political offices become null and void. Nobody who has been in any office for more than a year can ever re-enter politics. It would also be helpful at that point to break up too-large corporations and cancel debts.
It's like controlled burning.
Much of the misery and stagnation we face today is down to a lack of planned destruction.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jubilee_
Also a lot of the voter influecing is done through almost invisible campaigns such as the "carbon footprint" or neo-liberal content in tv soaps and the like.
Generally the „products” share a prefix with one of the parties.
For example, KO (koalicja obywatelska) - kolendra (cilantro).
[0]: https://twitter.com/dominikdrzazga/status/171360390555935949...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Election_silence
[2] https://reddit.com/r/AskEurope/s/17Uoq4jwIa
Personally I thinks it's a good idea - voting ahould be calm and considered.
Unlike discussions in your house of commons...
Say you were willing to cheat to have your candidate win the vote. Not uncommon historically through out the world. One way of doing it is to wait for election results, then make up the margin with fake ballots or fraud. This is why the opportunity to cheat is greater if elections take a week to tabulate, as opposed to same day results.
Not knowing the results, and not being able to game the system, even for one day, in theory should more accurately reflect the will of the general population, even the ones that don't vote.
Apart from countries with mandatory elections, like Australia which reaches ~90% turnout.
How does "not voting" not reflect the will of the people? They're not forced to not vote. It's their will to not vote.
Sampling Errors, where the method of voting favors only certain demographics would produce such results