

Real democracy? Hungary to give mothers an extra vote for each child - sep
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/17/hungary-mothers-get-extra-votes

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abeld
This idea was scrapped after some public polling, see:

[http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&h...](http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout=2&eotf=1&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Findex.hu%2Fbelfold%2F2011%2F03%2F28%2Forban_meg_harcol_a_csaladi_szavazatert%2F&act=url)

Some blame the result of the polls on fears that the idea would give extra
votes to the roma minority, who, on average, have more kids and larger
families than the non-roma.

Some more background info: The population of Hungary is shrinking, which will
cause big problems after some decades with regard to funding pensions and such
(as you will have a shrinking working population having to finance the
pensions of a growing populations of pensioners). Also, the retired pensioners
form a large and easily mobilized voting force which means that politicians
are forced to pander to their interest by raising pensions and such. The plan
to allow children to vote (either directly or by giving extra votes to their
parents) would help somewhat with both issues.

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lupatus
This seems to go against the principles of feminism and the women's suffrage
movements where equality was the goal. Instead it would give mothers a
privileged position in Hungarian society at the expense of males and women
without children.

If this is acceptable to Hungarian society, why were previous privileged
classes, such as landowners or aristocrats or male heads-of-household or
Communist party leaders, morally wrong and subsequently vilified?

If this passes, I expect that that in a few decades, or less, mothers will be
vilified and used as scapegoats for whatever social ills ail Hungary simply
because they would be the privileged class in power.

