MA: Keeping the Voting Booths Clean Act (Vetoed)

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

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[Warren 4 Secretary of Everything]

I'm sorry, but this is just out of hand. What is the real point of this amendment?

[Gass3268]

Yeah I agree with Clinton. I don't think I can support this.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

To clarify what exactly counts as campaigning in a thread and make things easier on booth administrators, so that problems like these are avoided:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=170924.msg3666115#msg3666115

And the debacle starting here: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=166950.msg3683208#msg3683208

A voting booth is for voting.  There's no need for commentary.  And clause 9 should be a no brainer... there's no reason someone should ever vote in something that's not English, requiring a translation to decipher how they voted.

[Warren 4 Secretary of Everything]

A voting booth is for voting.  There's no need for commentary.  And clause 9 should be a no brainer... there's no reason someone should ever vote in something that's not English, requiring a translation to decipher how they voted.

I can understand Clause 9, but when vote in say, French or Spanish, wouldn't the names still be the same.
And Clause 10 is just way too far. There is no utterance of lobbying for any one candidate in any of the phrases you mentioned in the Amendment. Campaigning would be more like "Everyone should vote for so-and-so for this office."

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

What's the purpose of voting in French or Spanish?  Why would anybody have to do that?

There's no lobbying in that?  It lobbies for those candidates over write-ins.

The point is that the voting booth serves one purpose: to vote.  Commentary only clutters things up.  There's no need for it.  It serves no useful purpose, and it only leads to confusion and lawsuits.  I see no harm in restricting people to actually voting in the voting booth.

[Gass3268]

Section 9 bothers me the most. I don't like the idea of legally endorsing a certain language.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Section 9 bothers me the most. I don't like the idea of legally endorsing a certain language.

Why?  The ballots are written in English.  What would be a valid purpose of then translating the ballot into another language?  This isn't saying, "English is the superior language."  It's saying, "This is a game; there's no reason that a voter should be translating his vote into Russian. Doing so only makes more work for the voting booth administrator."

We already "endorse" a language by publishing the ballots in English; it's not like this is an issue of readability or disenfranchising someone who can't read the English ballot.  If someone "needs" to vote in a non-English language, then they can't read English to begin with, and probably aren't part of Atlasia (or the forum at all, for that matter).

[ZuWo]

I support this bill. The most recent special Senate election has shown that there is a need for clarification of what is allowed in the voting booth and what should be considered an act of campaigning for or against someone.
First of all, I think it's sensible to require that ballots be posted in English. To a certain degree we are all more or less able to read and write English and the official ballots are published in English anyway. Additionally, it's a real nuisance for the election booth administrator to try to determine and verify the intent of a voter who posts his ballot in a foreign language and uses a different alphabet (this happens regularly in the IDS and could be a potential problem in any other Atlasian region). I am aware that the election booth administrator is generally required to do everything in his power to determine voter intent, but I think we cannot require him to read and understand a ballot in very exotic languages ("exotic" from our point of view), which would be very time-consuming.
Secondly, comments such as "I happily/reluctantly vote for X" involve a value judgement and can, therefore, be interpreted as an attempt to influence other voters to vote in a certain way. Thus, ballots which include such comments should, in my opinion, be declared invalid.

[Lumine]

I understand the concerns about endorsing another language, but I tend to agree with Zuwo. After all, all of us use English to communicate in Atlasia, So what is the point behind voting in another language?

Also, and speaking from a more personal point of view, I'm not a native speaker of the English language, but I understand Atlasia is built around it, and I don't feel discriminated for having to write and vote in said language. Why complicate things when we can avoid having such problems everytime we hold an election?

Still, we must recognize that this is a Federal issue, more than a Mideast one. If I remember correctly, we had votes in foreign language in the last IDS Election, and problems with a "stated preference ballot" in the last At-Large Senate Elections. Some would argue that it's best to wait for the Senate to take the initiative on this matter, but perhaps it's wiser to start here, to see the potential issues arising from a purely regional level.

And to finish my intervention, a small suggestion: Is it that hard to create a topic where you explain your vote or you give the same comment that some voters place on the ballot?

[Talleyrand]

I don't see any problem with voting in a foreign language, although obviously I'd prefer English. This is an internet forum, and all the administrator has to do is type the message into a translator; I've never seen PiT or Homely complain about that.

As for campaigning in a voting booth, I tend to think of it as openly encouraging other candidates to vote for one candidate on another. Saying "I reluctantly vote for" or "I happily vote for" or "all candidates are great" does not constitute that in my opinion. A lot of our older members have tendencies to do that, and it's not fair to throw out their posts just because they're not aesthetically pleasing. There are certain things which should definitely be considering campaigning in the booth, like "Inks, ought to resign as moderator" or "Candidate A can go screw himself", but the statements described here are harmless.

[tmthforu94]

I would tend to agree that voters should be able to vote in any language - maybe just require that they specify what language they are voting in to make it easier on the administrator?

For what it is worth, this wouldn't have affected one vote in the January and March regional elections. I'm not sure I agree with punishing the occasional voter for noting how fantastic all candidates are. I also think mentioning how you absolutely won't vote for one candidate or saying why you would vote for another would fall under what the law currently states is prohibited.

Personally, I think we're using the regional legislature to try and solve a problem that mainly exists on the federal level. In my many months (going on 15) as Governor, I've never really experienced any of this as a problem. Maybe an occasional person or two adding in an additional, low preference of "Tough Decision" or something, but nothing major like what happened in the most recent federal election. I think just running a PR campaign discouraging voters from making those types of comments would be sufficient.

I remain on the fence - how this debate develops will likely decide whether or not I sign it. My one request at this point would be for the Assembly just requiring that a voter state what language their ballot is in (other than English). Not that I think we've ever had this problem in the Mideast, though...

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I don't see why "This has only been a problem at the federal level" should mean that we shouldn't pass preventative measures here.

[Lumine]

It's beginning to look like we'll end up with a similar result as the Common Courtesy While Driving Act, and we have two divided sides that either support the bill or they reject it. Speaker Inks, Assemblyman Zuwo and myself have stated a support of the bill, and both Assemblyman Gass and Assemblyman Talleyrand expressed concerns about Clauses 9 and 10, mostly because of the endorsement of English and the possibility of harsh judgement on Clause 9.

Now, I can't think of any change we could do right now, but is there any chance we could reach a better compromise by changing the language or modifying certain parts of it?

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

I'm more willing to compromise on Clause 10 than 9... there's no legitimate reason someone should ever vote in a non-English language.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Alright, I'll split this into two bills, because I'm adamant about getting clause 9 passed, so for now, I'll amend the bill to be restricted solely to clause 9.

[Talleyrand]

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I propose the preceding amendment.

[tmthforu94]

I would fully support this amendment and would be happy to sign it. I'd recommend though changing the language to specifically require that they indicate the language on their ballot.

[Gass3268]

I could support Talleyrand's amendment

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Google translate has an option that can detect the language, so TexasDem's amendment doesn't do much.

I'd ask supporters of this amendment: Name one good reason that someone should cast a ballot in another language.

[SUSAN CRUSHBONE]

Google translate has an option that can detect the language, so TexasDem's amendment doesn't do much.

Google Translate doesn't have some languages (like Cyrillic Moldavian or whatever it was) but in that case a note wouldn't help anyway.

[ZuWo]

Google translate has an option that can detect the language, so TexasDem's amendment doesn't do much.

Google Translate doesn't have some languages (like Cyrillic Moldavian or whatever it was) but in that case a note wouldn't help anyway.

Thanks for pointing that out. This is a good reason to require voters to cast their votes in English. Unless we should require all future election booth administrators to take classes in Cyrillic Moldovian or other languages/alphabets that Google Translate doesn't have.

Let me bring up another example to illustrate the problem of allowing voters to cast their ballot in whatever language they choose: For instance, a voter could use Russian sounds and Greek letters in his ballot; or worse, sounds and letters of languages that are even more exotic for most of us. The voter in question could still claim that his vote was in Russian because when you manage to read what he wrote you get a Russian word. However, it would be very hard for the administrator of the election to figure out what the voter intended. This may seem like a far-fetched example, but it shows that there is a loophole both under the current statute and with Talleyrand's amendment.

[MyRescueKittehRocks]

As English is the lingua franca of a vast majority of Atlasians and Mideasterners, this is common sense legislation. I have nothing against those who desire to use a foreign language. In fact I use Spanish regularly at work and have attempted to preach the Good News of Jesus in said language. However I see this move as one to keep our vote free of needless corruption of a bad interpretation of a voter's intent.

[Queen Mum Inks.LWC]

Just because a language is given doesn't mean it'll be easy on the administrator.

What if I make up the Inksian language, substituting small letters for capitals and capitals for small letters (i.e. a=F, b=W, G=r, etc.) and post a thread with a translation guide?  Should booth administrators have to go through letter by letter to translate my ballot?

[tmthforu94]

Okay, then add a clause saying it must be a language used on Google Translate.