When you have to get a job, you can't simply get an interview with a blank resume. If you want to take the MCAT, you can't just walk in to the exam hall with zero medical knowledge.
Why shouldn't the same go for voting? Education is paramount for a good democracy. If the national education system doesn't work, even fixing it is futile because there are already so many indoctrinated and uneducated voters in the population. The best option is to weed out the uneducated ones from the educated ones.
The political education test would be similar to a test you take for naturalization: it quizzes you on the party system, how the nation was founded, what the Bill of Rights specifies, et al.
Right now the only qualification to vote is citizenship. That needs to be changed.
The problem is you can educate stupid people but it won't make them not stupid. By definition 50% of people are left of the mean on the IQ spectrum. By HN standards probably 80% of all people are hopeless.
When you make "being educated" a prerequisite for voting you necessarily create an underclass. You prevent people who are "undereducated", as defined by those who are "educated" (see the problem there?), from participating in society. That is, you strip them of citizenship. They are not represented.
I don't know if that's good or bad. Many argue that democracy is inherently flawed because of people's general unintelligence. I think this argument has much merit. But you can't solve the flaw within democracy itself. Which means maybe there is another, better system of governance out there, and democracy isn't the be-all and end-all we've been raised to think of it as.
Democracy isn't a good thing in and of itself, basically, so maybe we should re-evaluate.
> Many argue that democracy is inherently flawed because of people's general unintelligence.
It'd be great if elections could be fought on something more substantial than a candidate's haircut or who most people would rather drink a beer with.
I don't think that general lack of intelligence is responsible for people creating or publishing polls about drinking beer with candidates.
People get fed this tripe.
And even on HN it's hard to have political discussions. Every political thread will have some great, insightful, thoughtful, comments, and a bunch of tedious partisan bickering.
Any adequate test of people's understanding of politics and the democratic process would fail anyone who thought testing understanding of politics and the democratic process was compatible with democracy....
The essence of democracy is that you don't need a detailed understanding of the history, voter mechanics or text of a particular law to express a valid preference for or against a candidate that has something to say that concerns you, however imperfect your understanding of that candidate's intentions and their likely consequences may be. If you can't grasp that, bar yourself from the ballot box.
(and that's without discussing the obvious electoral advantages to an incumbent that might accrue from influence over setting "voter tests". Sure, you have to pass a bar to be allowed to work for somebody, or study somewhere, or borrow money - that's all for the testers' benefit)
Emotionally, I totally get you. But otherwise. . .who would decide what topics should be covered? Who would decide what the "correct" answers are? Have you heard of all the disagreements about what should go into/be taken out of school textbooks, especially those for history and social studies? Going in a slightly different direction. . .There was a time in the not-so-distant American past when there were tests like what you describe. (As well as questions about the number of bubbles in a bottle of dishwashing detergent, but I digress.) That's one of the many reasons we have the Voting Rights Act. (And yes, I know there are questions about whether or not we still need it.) Let's no go back there. But emotionally, I get it.
You shouldn't have to take a test to vote. This should be incentive for all of us to try to raise the level of education of the general public to ensure an informed electorate.
Cutting people out of the system will only result in second class citizens. We need to raise people up, not push them down.
Pay for higher education for all citizens, stop teaching to the test in primary education and actually value critical thinking. Skepticism and curiosity need to be the key tools of our society, so that people can discover for themselves what the truth is and whom they agree with politically. Education would also lead to more skilled laborers and should help us compete in the global economy.
Much of what is good about democracy comes from the balance it strikes between the need for governance and things like self determination and personal liberty.
If you have one group deciding what sort of person deserves self determination, you aren't striking that balance anymore.
Why shouldn't the same go for voting? Education is paramount for a good democracy. If the national education system doesn't work, even fixing it is futile because there are already so many indoctrinated and uneducated voters in the population. The best option is to weed out the uneducated ones from the educated ones.
The political education test would be similar to a test you take for naturalization: it quizzes you on the party system, how the nation was founded, what the Bill of Rights specifies, et al.
Right now the only qualification to vote is citizenship. That needs to be changed.