Is it a sin to vote 3rd party if I live in a blue state?

  • Thread starter Thread starter BenSinner
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
B

BenSinner

Guest
I’m wanting to vote but I can’t in good conscience vote for the Republican nominees because some of them have borderline segregation policies and have caved into pro-choice stances. I’m most assuredly not voting Democrat either.

I really believe in a 3rd party candidate that has the most consistent views with my Catholic beliefs.

The only problem is, I’ve heard that 3rd party votes end up going to one of the big 2. Since I live in a blue state, my vote will be sent to the Democratic candidate.

Is it a sin for me to vote for a 3rd party candidate, because of this?
 
I believe it comes down to prudential judgment. I have voted with third parties on a few occasions when I felt like the difference between the two leading candidates was negligible and neither one was acceptable. If enough people do that, a third-party candidate may win.

Other times I’ve held my nose and voted for one of the two leading candidates who was less terrible than the other. Here in California they now have open primaries with only two candidates for state offices in the general election, so unless you like either of the candidates, you have have to vote for the lesser of two evils or abstain.
 
It isn’t a sin. It might be sinful if you voted for a third party candidate specifically because they supported something immoral.
 
Would be no sin to vote for a third party

Blue state has nothing to do with it either

You could also not vote

Wether you vote or not
Unless done for some evil reason you’re not sinning

You might be scrupulous like myself
 
You vote for the candidate who is most likely to undo the evil.
 
There’s no sin with voting third party. Look at the document @TheLittleLady has linked to, it will clear things up for you.
 
BenSinner said:
The only problem is, I’ve heard that 3rd party votes end up going to one of the big 2. Since I live in a blue state, my vote will be sent to the Democratic candidate.
Click to expand...
Does it literally get counted towards the Republican or Democratic candidate? That type of vote tampering is itself sketchy, but them supposedly all going to the candidate who aligns with the government is dictatorial, to the point I find it hard to believe on account of total lack of coverage on such a matter. (Well, there’s a total lack of coverage from respectable news outlets. Maybe Breitbart has claimed such, but that’s not respectable.)

With that said, I know many complain about third party votes helping the winner in close elections, but that’s based on the faulty assumption that all those third party votes would have gone one way - or existed at all - if the third party options weren’t available. Basically, they argue that you’re indirectly voting for the other candidate, but that is, again, based on very faulty reasoning.

So no, I don’t think there’s any sin in voting third party. It’s gotten to the point that you’d probably have to just to find a reasonable candidate.
 
Probably not applicable to the US elections, but UK we use paper ballots so writing ‘ALL GARBAGE’ would still be counted as a spoilt ballot.
 
BenSinner said:
The only problem is, I’ve heard that 3rd party votes end up going to one of the big 2. Since I live in a blue state, my vote will be sent to the Democratic candidate.
Click to expand...
Such votes do not go to, nor are they sent to, a candidate other than the one you voted for. If enough people vote for other parties, even though they lose the election, it sends a message to the big 2 parties.

The thinking behind that erroneous claim is that some past elections would have had a different outcome if voters had only two choices. If a certain candidate had not run, the election may have swung the other way. But the reality is that elections allow more than two candidates, and voters may vote for the candidate they most approve of, even if that candidate is sure to lose.
BenSinner said:
I really believe in a 3rd party candidate that has the most consistent views with my Catholic beliefs.
Click to expand...
Think of that candidate as a prophet in the desert. Most people think he is a fool, but we need to have him around, and we need to listen. Go out and vote for that candidate.
 
Last edited:
This is why I like the Australian voting system. If there were, for example, six candidates running for office you would have to number all of them in order of preference one to six.

When the ballots are counted, if no candidate has an absolute majority then the votes of the lowest-scoring candidate are redistributed to their second-choice candidates. And if no candidate still has a majority then the lowest-scoring candidate again gets their votes redistributed.

That way the person who.gets elected is the one who is most popular with the most voters instead of someone who may have got more than their opponents but be very unpopular with a majority of voters.
 
Last edited:
GodSpawned said:
Probably not applicable to the US elections, but UK we use paper ballots so writing ‘ALL GARBAGE’ would still be counted as a spoilt ballot.
Click to expand...
I like it!

(I have been informally and only on a personal level advocating for a “none of the above” option.)

D
 
Do you really still use only paper in the UK? I wish we did, but doesn’t it take forever to get the results?
 
Loud-living-dogma said:
Do you really still use only paper in the UK? I wish we did, but doesn’t it take forever to get the results?
Click to expand...
Not really. There are laws stating that the counting of votes must have begun at least four hours after the vote closes and the second stage of counting (what is actually on the ballot as opposed to how many ballots there are) should start by 2am. Obviously this varies a little, but those times are expected to be adhered to. Typically most constituencies have counted everything and are able to declare a vote by the morning after the vote - only one constituency hadn’t finished counting by the next morning in the 2017 general election.
 
They have looked at electronic voting, realized how appalling the security on them is, [EDIT- more recent article] and decided its a bad idea.
For a general election or for referendums, counting has to start on the night. Local elections can be counted in the morning. Even in 2010 (where the election resulted in a hung parliament) you knew the approximate number of seats by 7 am. Some seats (normally safe ones for one party or another) can declare really quickly.
 
Last edited:
Of course not. You need to vote; but if you find a party that has everything that you want, and is in line with correct morality, go for it.

All this ‘Don’t throw away your vote!’ is just, to me, a theme of the parties. ‘Keep eating the junk we give you…’

These parties are just the latest in American history. Trying to make new ones is a good thing. No one votes federalist or whig anymore.
 
Jimbo said:
Of course not. You need to vote; but if you find a party that has everything that you want, and is in line with correct morality, go for it.

All this ‘Don’t throw away your vote!’ is just, to me, a theme of the parties. ‘Keep eating the junk we give you…’

These parties are just the latest in American history. Trying to make new ones is a good thing. No one votes federalist or whig anymore.
Click to expand...
Agreed. If everyone who complained about both the major parties voted third party there may be a serious third party contender.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top