Tactical Voting

My immediate thought is that nobody should vote for any of them.

I understand that people sometimes find themselves in situations where it seems that any way of not voting for any of the candidates is a worse option. But is this one of those cases? Is there no good way available to a Conservative MP of not voting for any of the candidates?

If I were being asked to give ethical advice to a Conservative MP (and that is what we’re being asked to do here, in a hypothetical way), it would be: ‘Resign from the Conservative Party, admit you were wrong all along, and apologise for the error.’

Obviously I know that none of them are going to do this, but then I don’t generally expect people will follow my ethical advice: still, if I’m being asked for it, that’s what it is.

On reflection, however, a further thought occurs to me, responding more directly to the question posed, and it’s this: as far as I can tell (which is an important qualification, because I haven’t been following closely) the probability is negligible that the inclusion or exclusion, at any stage of the process, of any of the candidates, will have an effect on the inclusion or exclusion from the debate of important sensible ideas that merit discussion. Enlighten my ignorance: what are the important sensible ideas meriting discussion which will be burked if Hunt is Johnson’s opponent in the final run-off but which might get an airing if it’s somebody else?

@3 Voting has both functions – to express your views and to select a representative as close to those views as possible. Tactical voting puts priority on the second.

Most of the time, Alternative Vote/Instant Runoff systems let you do both. Tirst support your most preferred, but unelectable candidate. Then, when that candidate is eliminated, your preferences flow to the better of the two candidates who actually have a chance. This doesn’t always work, but the exceptions are rare in practice.

In this context, what’s the point of the multiple rounds in the Tory contest? Presumably, the voters have a pretty clear idea of who the candidates are. The only point of the multiple rounds seems to be to facilitate the bad kind of tactical voting and vote-buying.

@John Quiggin 4
” what’s the point of the multiple rounds in the Tory contest?”

Suppose a two rounds referendum about brexit, that starts with 3 options:
a) Revoke
b) WA
c) exit with no deal

In the first round, the least voted option is eliminated; in the second round, people can choose only between two items, so that one will necessariously have the absolute majority.
I’d say that it isn’t all that bad, if in the end you have to choose one single option.

The other option would be to have the item that got most votes in the first round win immediately; compared to this, multiple rounds seem fairer to me.

Or to put it in another way, if faction A has enough votes to play this second kind of tactical votes, probably with a different system where the one who gets a plurality wins they would win anyway.

As a tactic, it sounds like a relative of the classic ‘wrecking vote’, where you vote for what you think is the most unacceptable version of whatever it is you already don’t like (whether it’s a version of a bill, or a leader of a political party, and so on), in an attempt to derail the whole project. It’s in the same spirit as the “Tories for Corbyn” meme of 2015, for instance. Leaving aside any moral questions, you can criticize it in terms of game theory by pointing out the big downside gambles involved: a) your insincere promotion of this candidate/position could actually be taken seriously and give them/it more respectability; b) if the ‘derailed’ version somehow prevails anyway, you’re getting the worst possible outcome.

Let me slightly alter the terms of the issue. So long as our electoral systems are constituted in ways that allow for tactical voting, there are limited, purely ethical grounds for objecting to people engaging in such voting, as the response could well be that such ethical injunctions would end up in something akin to unilateral disarmament. A very strong ethical argument can be made against the role of private money in elections, based on its corrupting effects, but should I be expected to follow that injunction to my disadvantage, if the rules permit it and others are exploiting the rules? Perhaps the focus should be on how we devise electoral systems that abate, if not completely prevent, their gaming for the purpose of undermining the democratic will, such as preventing a choice between the leading candidates.

@6 I need to explain better. In the instant runoff system, each voter ranks the alternatives in order of preference. So, when the least favored option is eliminated, there’s no need for a second round of voting. The counters simply take all the votes for that option and allocate them to the option that got their second preference.

The only reason for a second round is if voters want to change their preference ordering when they see the results of the first round. That can only be the case with tactical voting.

I don’t mean to be disputatious, but coming from someone whose observations I usually find careful and interesting, I’m quite taken aback by John Quiggin’s remarks at no. 14, for despite their brevity they contain so many questionable assumptions I don’t quite know where to begin to challenge them.

Is it really the case, for one, that the Brexit vote can be reduced to old people overriding the young?

As to whether the outcome will barely affect those who “won’t be around much longer,” that claim surely depends on a particular narrow view of what might constitute someone’s interest. (To switch to another interest here: should those of us who won’t be around in 10, 20, 50 years simply sit back and say, “well, climate change won’t really impact my life much, so it’s none of my concern”?)

With respect to “the standard assumption,” it hasn’t been something I’ve observed, that we are all only interested in, and ought to be only interested in things which affect ourselves and our extended selves, our children and grandchildren. At least some of us have larger concerns.

As with the first point I tried to make, respecting the interpretation of the Brexit vote, it is surely at least debatable, that the older voters were merely engaging in “an exercise in nostalgia”?

But to me the most distressing of JQ’s points is the last one: “you have to ask whether they should be allowed to vote on matters that don’t really concern them.” Surely anyone who is a democrat and who wants to see democracy extended and deepened will be shocked by this notion, that the right to vote should be restricted to those who can somehow prove that they have a legitimate concern respecting the matter being voted on?

> @ Cian – “They don’t care about the country”. I don’t see what’s wrong with Tories voting to keep themselves in power. In a democracy that means they have managed to be the most popular choice. If the people care about the country then that means doing things that the majority of people who care about the country approve of. That’s how democracies work, isn’t it?

I’m merely stating that Tory MPs are voting based upon what they think will allow them to keep their job for as long as possible. Which for many of them may just mean delaying a general election and avoiding deselection by their local parties. I don’t think there’s much consideration about policy, or even ideology, at this point.

President of Oxford University Conservative Association iirc. For better or worse I only really listen Radio 3 so can’t comment on his interviewing abilities.

@ John Quiggin “The whole exercise involves old people voting to override the young on an issue …”

There’s a separate post in itself right there. At what age do CTers think people have accumulated too much experience and become too old to vote? Have you passed that age yourself and stopped voting? Do you intend to carry on voting after you have reached that age?

FWIW UK citizens resident elsewhere can register to vote if they have been on the electoral register in the past. You vote in whichever constituency you were most recently registered.

Harry: I’m not sure that JQ has thought through his proposal to disenfranchise the elderly because they won’t live long enough to be affected by the consequences of their votes.

Young people die too. Some have congenital genetic defects (cystic fibrosis and a range of other syndromes) which mean they will not live to be old. Others, initially healthy, may be diagnosed as having incurable and lethal diseases. Should these, on JQ’s principles, be disenfranchised also? If not, why not?

A complicating factor: a cure for a previously incurable disease may be developed. On JQ’s principles, it looks as if AIDS patients should have been disenfranchised, but any survivors re-enfranchised after antiretroviral therapies were developed.

Another complication. Some groups of people have shorter life expectancies, on average. Smokers die younger. Should they therefore be disenfranchised at an earlier age?

And notoriously, poor people on average die younger than rich people. Should they therefore …

Thanks for your response to my previous, Harry (@ 21). Our geo-political situations are in fact rather similar—I, too, am British, but I’ve lived almost my entire adult life in the US—and like you I retain both a sense of connectedness to and involvement in the UK, yet I not only accept but approve of the fact that I cannot vote there since I wouldn’t experience any consequences. I actually also feel some reluctance to engage too vigorously in discussions about what is happening there since, again, I will not significantly experience any of the consequences of what I say. In other words, I quite understand why you and I and others might well impose a self-denying ordinance on ourselves.

Equally, I accept that there might be legal constraints on our voting in places we no longer live in and, as you say, are most unlikely to live there again in any foreseeable future. (Since I do go back quite a long way, even though I wasn’t then certain that I would not be returning to live in Britain, I was opposed to Thatcher’s invention of British absentee ballots, and not just because she did it because she thought—or so it was suggested—she and her party would benefit from the votes of a large right-wing, “ex-pat” vote.)

But I think we disagree on the interpretation of JQ’s statement, “When, instead, they trash the future in (at the most charitable) an exercise in nostalgia, you have to ask whether they should be allowed to vote on matters that don’t really concern them.” It’s that “allowed to vote,” especially in conjunction with the notion that the disallowance should be predicated on the perception—for it’s surely not an unassailable fact—that they are trashing the future, that sticks in my craw. For he’s not saying people should do what we willingly do, namely, abstain from political action when they won’t bear significant consequences. He’s saying someone, something, should somehow prevent from voting those who are legally permitted to vote. I can’t read what he says in any other way.

*****
Since I’m here, I also want to disagree with reason (@25), that “constitutions are supposed to be common agreed non-partisan rules of the game.” Tell that to the American anti-Federalists. Tell that to anyone anywhere who was on the losing side when a constitution was being deliberately constructed. Tell that to all those in Britain who have any historical perspective on the way its “unwritten constitution” was written. (I’m particularly aggrieved at the introduction of the 5 year for the most part fixed Parliament statute, not least because, as I see it, that has considerably contributed to the whole Brexit shambles.) In short, the notion that constitutions can be or have ever been composed a-politically is just a fantasy.

JQ@28=9:
“As regards my suggestion that the selfish old shouldn’t be able to vote, it was meant rhetorically, rather than literally”.

Well, you win a prize for very rapid shifting of goalposts. This week’s, this month’s, this year’s …

Could I ask that in future, when you post a suggestion which if taken literally is obviously ridiculous (see my post above, on which you have not commented) you add a warning that it was only meant to be taken rhetorically. Would you agree that rhetoric, by your definition, is something obviously untrue?

Your second paragraph, saying that older voters display ignorance, selfishness and irresponsibility, seems a very good example of rhetoric.

I agree that Quiggin was responding directly to support for disenfranchising young people. Saying, “well, ok, but surely then you need to also disenfranchise the old” makes sense in that context.

The thing about these “gross generalisations about the elderly” is that they’re based on facts – we hold elections, we measure who voted how, and we observe that the older a voter is the more likely it is to for for rather than against climate change. Viz, they vote against effective action to reduce or mitigate climate change. The pattern is also seen with Brexit AFAIK.

There are other factors and patterns, but I think it’s hard to argue against that one. In Australia it’s tricky because there are so few parties in favour of action to reduce climate change effects, but those parties do get more votes from the young, and those strongly in favour of climate change get more votes from the old. But since the far right are also overwhelmingly in favour of the rich (who are old) it’s a little hard to tell… OTOH, rich climate change enthusiasts are far more of a problem than poor ones so tdoes it really matter.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-06-10/fact-check-would-voters-aged-under-30-possible-elect-a-green-pm/7467068

@Stephen, my apologies for forgetting Rule #23: The Internet doesn’t do irony. Next time I’ll remember the irony alerts. Still, since irony happens, I’d suggest that when you encounter a suggestion that seems obviously absurd, you consider it as a possibility.

@RobinM When you are talking about general rules, you have to invoke generalizations . As you can easily check, I’m an old white male myself, so I’m generalizing about a cohort to which I belong. Sadly, in general, and specifically as regards voting, that cohort has displayed all the characteristics to which I refer (even though many are very nice in other respects). *irony alert on* Of course it would be much better to restrict voting to sensible people, like your friends (and, for that matter, my friends). But that’s not feasible *irony alert off*

What is good about the podcast is Robinson’s other premise which is basically that in the long form interview it is very hard for politicians to disguise who they are. A typical pattern—Dominic Raab, Steve Baker and Esther McVey all comform—is that they start out seeming reasonable and perfectly decent but end up seeming either nuts (Baker), poisonous (McVey) or both (Raab). [Of course, plenty of interviewees (eg David Lidington, Stella Creasey, David Gauke) end up seeming exactly as they did at the beginning—smart, serious, decent].

That sounded interesting to me, so I listened to one of the interviews–I chose the one with Esther McVey–but I didn’t get the same sense of it. I knew nothing about Esther McVey going in except that she was a Conservative politician (which predisposed me against her). My impression, after listening to the interview from beginning to end, was that she comes across fairly consistently throughout: I thought that people like me, starting with a negative view of Conservative politicians and of the kind of positions espoused by Esther McVey, would probably be confirmed in a negative view by listening to the interview, but would not find it dramatically revelatory, while people who started with a positive view of Conservative politicians and of the kind of positions espoused by Esther McVey would also not find the interview dramatically revelatory and would probably find nothing in it to challenge or disturb the attitudes they started with.

I suppose it’s possible that some of the other interviews would give me a different impression, but the probability of it doesn’t seem great enough to justify the investmend of additional time in listening to more of them.

reason

Thomas Jefferson argued that the earth belongs to the living and not to the dead, that the dead are nothing and can therefore have no rights, that therefore the living should not be ruled by the dead and that generations have the same right to be independent of each other as do nations, and that therefore a new constitution should be effected whenever the majority of the adults who adopted the preceding one have died (which, according to his knowledge of the mortality rates of his own time, he estimated should be about every twenty years).

Anyway, the current Conservative leadership doesn’t seem to have a outstandlingly nduitable candidate that could be voted for tacticaly. (Unless you count Brexiteers voting for Rory Stewart on the basis that “of course” he will loose in late rounds).

Yes, in a sane universe Boris would bethe obviously unsuitable candidate that gets voted for tacically, but here he seems to be the genuine preference.

JQ @34: ah, irony. An old friend. Verbal irony, the kind applicable here, consists of saying one thing while really meaning the opposite; or being taken by the hearers as involving the opposite.

So when you wrote “When, instead, they [the old] trash the future in (at the most charitable) an exercise in nostalgia, you have to ask whether they should be allowed to vote on matters that don’t really concern them”, was your ironic meaning that they did not in fact trash the future; or that what they did was not an exercise in nostalgia; or that they should be allowed to vote; or that these matters do really concern them? Or some permutation of these?

I think, non-ironically, that you’re tying yourself in knots.

I appreciate, I think, the point you make @ 34, John. And your response is perhaps more courteous than I deserve. Your generosity even extended to putting me in your generation, but that is only a very rough approximation to the truth. But still, all irony aside, I continue to have a problem with generalisations applied to age cohorts.

Let me first say, that I’ve never been a fan of generational thinking. (Wasn’t it Feuer who sought to dismiss opposition to the war on Vietnam, support for civil rights, etc. as merely a generational rebellion against the parents? It’s a bit odd to encounter, half a century later, the notion that we’re still engaged in generational revolt, only this time against our children and grandchildren.)

I was quite aware—as you perhaps were too—that when ‘ours’ was the younger generation there were major politically significant differences within that generation. It was therefore no surprise to me that some of my generation became Trump supporters, Tories, etc., etc. Now perhaps you’re right in what I think you’re at least implicitly suggesting, that many, perhaps a majority of the generation we both approximately belong to hold political, social, economic, and cultural views we deplore. But shouldn’t we be concerned with the political consequences of glossing over, even ironically glossing over, significant differences within an age cohort in order to make a point?

To me, one of the more troubling aspects of the times we now live in is the way in which so many people are so casually mis-categorised and dismissed. I’ll again make it a personal point, if you’ll forgive me: Although I now live part time in northern California and part time in New York, I lived for many years in Wisconsin. The number of times, especially since 2016, I’ve felt pressed to respond to generalisations coming from liberal-minded Californians and New Yorkers about the “deplorables” inhabiting “fly-over country” is beyond count. Those making these comments seem to be not only ignorant of the diversity of views in a place like Wisconsin, they actually seem to care less that they are perhaps making just that bit more difficult the political task of the those in such places—numerous enough to, e.g., keep Tammy Baldwin in the US Senate and to drive Scott Walker from the governorship—who actually broadly share their politics.

Thankyou for your time, I’ll try not to take up any more of it. r

RobinM

In particular, I am distressed that you assert “older voters”—NB. not SOME older voters—“older voters are displaying the ignorance, selfishness, and irresponsibility . . .”

There is a potentially unfortunate ambiguity, in this context, in the phrase ‘older voters’–it’s not because of anything special about that particular phrase, the same thing can happen, in some contexts, to nearly any plural noun phrase. If I make an assertion attributing some predicate to ‘older voters’, do I mean to be taken as asserting this of all older voters, or only of some older voters? If I assert that ‘people do X’, do I mean that all people do X, or that some people do X? In some contexts it should be clear, but in some contexts it won’t be.

Part of the problem is that in some contexts what is meant is stronger than a ‘some X’ assertion but weaker than an ‘all X’ assertion (and something that would take significantly longer to spell out in equally precise language). For example, in this context, it would be reasonable to assert that older voters favour Leave while younger voters favour Remain: I hope the meaning of that is clear, and the assertion uncontroversial, but when I assert that older voters favour Leave, I mean something more than ‘some older voters favour Leave’ but something less than ‘all older voters favour Leave’. Even ‘the majority of older voters favour Leave’ would not entirely capture the intended meaning.

Stephen

John Quiggin was deploying irony in conjunction with parody, specifically parody directed at (what John Quiggin took to be the meaning of) Dipper’s earlier comment. (It’s possible that John Quiggin misinterpreted Dipper’s comment and that the parody was unfair, but it’s still as that parody that John Quiggin’s comment should be understood.)

John Quiggin took Dipper to be suggesting that ‘maybe there is a justification for disenfranchising some people on the basis of their youth’ (Dipper referred specifically to 16-year-olds, and of course in most cases 16-year-olds are denied the vote on the basis of their youth). John Quiggin responded, parodically, that maybe there is a justification for disenfranchising some people on the basis of their (old) age. The irony is that, although putatively arguing in favour of a justification for disenfranchisement, John Quiggin actually intended, through parody, to argue against a justification for disenfranchisement. I admit, having made the attempt, that it is tricky to spell this out with precision, so it’s unsurprising if it gets missed.

RobinM

Let me first say, that I’ve never been a fan of generational thinking.

Then you should be pleased to know that John Quiggin has on more than one occasion argued vigorously against the generationeers.

I, too, decry generationeering as largely rubbish: but I can’t therefore deny that cohort effects do exist. More importantly, age effects do exist–unfortunately, age effects often get mistaken for and misdescribed as cohort effects (one of the ways in which generationeering is largely rubbish).

There’s no doubt that the fraction of older voters who favoured Leave was greater than the fraction of younger voters who did so: I don’t know whether this was an age effect or a cohort effect, but the effect is indisputable. (If being, now, in their sixties influenced a significant number of people to vote Leave, that’s an age effect; if having had the experience of living through the ’60s influenced a significant number of people to vote Leave, that’s a cohort effect. If it’s an age effect, the anti-EU older generation of today would have been more favourable to the EU when they were younger; if it’s a cohort effect, they would have been about as anti-EU when they were younger.)

Since the effect does exist, it might be worth analysing: it should be possible to carry out this analysis without lapsing into the kind of pop-psych generationeering that ignores the existence of other factors that affect people’s attitudes to the EU, or the many kinds of diversity which obviously characterise every age cohort.

I’ve felt pressed to respond to generalisations coming from liberal-minded Californians and New Yorkers about the “deplorables” inhabiting “fly-over country”

Good on you! Please do keep it up. That kind of thinking needs to be challenged.

However, it is possible to challenge that kind of thinking and yet still acknowledge that the experience of living in Provo is different from the experience of living in Providence, and that Provo votes differently from Providence, and that it might sometimes be worth discussing how and why.

‘Brexit would not have happened if the UK press had been objective in reporting on European matters.’

Essentially nothing in British politics since 1979 would have happened if the British press had been objective in reporting on any matter.

@RobinM We are, I think, in furious agreement. I dislike generational cliches, and have written many times abut this. As J-D explains in detail, I don’t intend to make claims about all older voters. I merely assert that, taken collectively, they haven’t shown a degree of superior wisdom that would justify denying the vote to teenagers on the grounds of immaturity.

– and about the ”Daily Mail Thing” and this theory that such ”rag-papers groom the people” -(for decades)

How… true? – but who ”grooms” whom – as I once heard a writer of the German ”rag-paper” (Bild) – say:
”I just write what the people want to read” – and my German Grandfather – who also turned into a more and more ”grouchy” man when he got older – just didn’t read the Bild – or the Daily Mail. When he read an English ”paper” he read the ”New Musical Express” –
or in other words – being well aware that ”newspapers like the Mail, Telegraph and Sun spewing out anti-EU propaganda. Brexit ISN’T evidence that those who control the mass media control society”. Or that ”Brexit would not have happened if the UK press had been objective in reporting on European matters”.

BE-cause that’s a lot like this excuse a lot of Americans currently using about America going to ”the dark side” -(and to Von Clownstick) – with blaming some MSM – or absurdly – some opposite InternetGreenwalds – in other words:
The Daily Mail -(or the Bild – or Fox News) – only has the power to make somebody vote for Brexit -(or Von Clownstick) if such a ”somebody” … let’s say ”can be influenced by rag-papers” like the Daily Mail the Bild or the National Enquirer.

AND who’s fault is that?

Not my grandfathers – as he opted for ”the New Musical” Express.
-(and a very ”Openminded English-Speaking Europe”)

Absolutely fascinating comment as usual by Dipper at 49. He suggests that a commenter wants to lock anyone he disagrees with in camps, and implies that this is a bad thing; then in the very next sentence sneers at Jeremy Corbyn for supposedly supporting an anti-semite’s right to free speech.

You really can’t win with these people. No principle means anything to them, except as a tool to bash anyone who disagrees with their political goals. They can sneer at people who they think want to restrict free speech in the same breath as they sneer at people who want to defend it, provided the people in question are their political enemies. There is no point in reasoning with them or arguing with them; drive them out of power or wait for old age to take them, but it certainly seems that discussing anything with them is a waste of time and effort.

‘When I was an Aussie living in London, one thing that always shocked me was the Tabloid press. I found it hard to understand. We had tabloids in Sydney (full of salacious gossip and page 3 girls) but one they never did was tell people how to think. I also wonder why the people that buy these rags put up with it.’

Never underestimate the strain of forelock tugging servility that is buried deep in the British psyche, and manifests itself in such forms as blind worship for the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha ‘British’ Royal Family, the right of the landed aristocracy to own half the country, and in many other ways (not least the propensity for all sectors of society to believe in the lies regularly pumped out by the media, both State and ‘private’). It was not for nothing that the non-British Robert Tressell coined the phrase ‘ragged trousered philanthropists’ to describe (some) of the British working class.

“discussing anything with them is a waste of time and effort.” says @ faustusnotes at the end of two paragraphs of wasted time and effort discussing with me.

So. Should i suggest @faustusnotes doesn’t spend the time and effort? Or to request he does spend the time and effort … I think keep it coming! A comment from @faustusnotes always brightens up my day.

… but to be serious, ignorant, selfish and irresponsible old Brexiters” is quasi-racist abuse and has no place in proper political discussion. To produce crude derogatory characterisations of people you disagree with to lessen their status as human beings and so undermine their right to hold opinions is not something that should be allowed to pass without challenge.

“Brexit is evidence that those who control the mass media control society”. This kind of conspiracy theorising is sadly popular on the left. There are two things wrong with it; firstly, again the characterisation of large sections of the population as people whose opinions can be freely ignored as they are too shallow and stupid to hold their own view or identify their own agency. Secondly it plays to the notion of shadowy groups of evil people exercising control over society. Usually international capitalists. And we all know which ethnic group tends to be associated with that description … so just stop it. Everyone can see what you are doing, it isn’t pretty, and it isn’t clever.

‘Everyone can see what you are doing, it isn’t pretty, and it isn’t clever.’

Stuff and nonsense

It occurred to me as soon as I’d clicked ‘Submit’ that the point I was getting at in my last line, and really needed to make explicit, is that it’s not anti-Semitic, or racist, or even ‘quasi-racist’, to make the obvious factual observation that there are people who control the Daily Mail (and the Sun, and Fox News, and so on), and that controlling major media outlets gives them power.

There is something (apart from the fact of controlling major media outlets) that is common to people who control major media outlets, and it’s not an ethnic or national or racial or religious background, and this leads on to my response to OldJim: of course cohort effects do exist (I’ve never denied it, and neither has John Quiggin), and of course age effects do exist (ditto), and of course age effects and cohort effects interact (ditto ditto). It is important to note that (not in every single particular case, but in general) age effects are more powerful than cohort effects, and it is important not to mistake and misdescribe age effects as cohort effects, but it is much more important to note that (not in every single particular case, but in general) there are other effects which are more powerful than age effects or cohort effects (independently or combined). It’s possible that the specific example of UK attitudes to the EU is an exception, and that in that case age effects and/or cohort effects really are the most important ones, I’m not insisting on that point one way or the other. However, in general, the biggest reason people like to tell themselves and each other stories about ‘the Greatest Generation’ and ‘the Baby Boomers’ and ‘Millenials’ and so on (for how long? how long!? must this be endured) is that it helps to distract attention (their own and that of others) from the fact (uncomfortable as it makes many people to acknowledge) that rich people behave and are treated differently from poor people.

@Dipper “To produce crude derogatory characterisations of people you disagree with” I’ve lost count of the times I’ve seen Remain supporters, Clinton voters and so on characterized as out of touch inner city elites (and much worse). Can you point to any statement from, say Farage or Johnson, or the Brexiteer press, on the need to be sensitive to the concerns of the 48 per cent of the population who voted No, comparable to the handwringing on the left about how to respond to working class Brexit voters? I mean this as a serious question: I can’t recall seeing anything of the kind, and if this is confirmation bias, I’d be glad to have it pointed out.

I’ve mentioned in a past discussion here that Dipper, personally, in discussions here, has complained about dismissive or derogatory comments being made about Leave supporters and yet also made dismissive or derogatory comments about Remain supporters.

Hilarious, now dipper wants to believe that criticism of a few rich peoples support for brexit is anti Semitic. Hilarious given that almost every nazi and anti Semite in Britain is a brexiteer.

Like I said, for these people there is no logic or facts, just rhetorical tricks in defense of their side. You can’t argue with people who refuse to accept facts or truth or logic and see all ideas as simply useful rhetorical tools in defense of their power.

Snowflakes–you lot call the young people, Dipper; and your accusation of narcissism is a patent finessing of the sentiments expressed in rude form by the exitfetishit gammon-shites—who thunder and screech out of the Question Time whirlwind. None of it derogatory, of course, from the scabs.

‘Large sections of the population are indeed of below average intelligence’

Indeed I believe it may even be possible to quantify the proportion.

Dipper “I’ve not seen Remain supporters described as elites.”

I find that impossible to believe. Time to draw this discussion to a close, I think

John Quiggin @4: Most of the time, Alternative Vote/Instant Runoff systems let you do both. Tirst support your most preferred, but unelectable candidate. Then, when that candidate is eliminated, your preferences flow to the better of the two candidates who actually have a chance. This doesn’t always work, but the exceptions are rare in practice.

Not that rare.

In fact, it appears that instant runoff goes wrong about a quarter of the time in practice, and up to three quarters of the time “when it matters” (that is, when plurality voting would give a different result from instant-runoff).

My own views on social choice theory and democratic ethics (and hence, of the OP ethical question on tactical voting) are quite heterodox among the general public but fairly common among people who’ve been down the rabbit hole of looking at voting systems. Roughly, as follows. A voter has the legal right to do whatever the voting system permits: that’s what it means for her to be a voter. But the goal of voting systems is to solve the social choice problem, and the people are demonstrably ill-served in this by all ordinal voting systems (most notably, plurality voting, instant-runoff, and Borda count) in all situations other than straight binary choice. Therefore, it is the ethical obligation of our elected representatives to either upgrade to cardinal voting systems like approval and range voting so that our collective will in nonbinary situations can be determined without any concerns about tactical voting, or exercise delegated power by breaking it down into discrete, sequenced binary votes on which we can be consulted within the systems we have. If they fail in both of these, it’s on them, not us, and our legal right to vote tactically, perversely, or randomly is our ethically proper and only redress.