Word for choose not to vote

‘CHOOSE NOT TO VOTE’ is a 15 letter
Phrase
starting with C and ending with E

Crossword answers for CHOOSE NOT TO VOTE

Editor’s Note: Susan Liautaud is the founder and managing director of Susan Liautaud & Associates Limited, which advises clients from global corporations to NGOs on ethics. Author of the forthcoming book “The Power of Ethics: How to Make Good Choices in a Complicated World,” she teaches at Stanford University, serves as chair of the Council of the London School of Economics and Political Science, and is the founder of the nonprofit platform The Ethics Incubator. The opinions expressed in this commentary are her own. View more opinion articles on CNN.

CNN
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I just received an email notification that my mail-in ballot was received and will count in November’s presidential election. This verification recorded one of the most ethically important decisions I make.

Voting is not just a right, it’s an ethical responsibility. And a candidate’s ethics, or the ethics of a particular issue, should be central to our choice.

But in these challenging times, voting – and considering a candidate’s ethics in our decision – can seem daunting. From the practicalities of mail-in ballots or showing up in person, to data privacy, Covid-19 and the very real racism embedded in our voting infrastructure, it may seem tempting to sit this one out rather than to consider our ethical responsibility.

Our elected officials have outsized opportunity and responsibility to model decisions and behaviors for good. The election of a leader is a game-changing opportunity to cauterize the spread of unethical behavior and its nefarious consequences and reset on a positive course. Or not.

When we abstain from voting we give up our power to determine who becomes a leader and influences the world – ethically and beyond. We don’t get to decide that neither candidate will be president.

Choosing not to vote diminishes your influence on matters like national security, domestic policy, privacy rights, Supreme Court appointments and immigration. You also forfeit your voice on cutting-edge issues such as internet safety, human germline editing, autonomous weapons, and artificial intelligence that will shape society with more widespread and unpredictable consequences than ever before.

And because you have the power to choose, you still have the responsibility for the choice. Opting not to vote does not absolve us of ethical responsibility for the risks and opportunities that ensue when a new leader takes office.

I never tell anyone how to resolve their ethical dilemmas, and I certainly wouldn’t tell anyone how they should vote. But I would offer a four-word framework for decision-making to help clarify the ethics of your decision whether or not to vote and your expectations for ethical political leadership.

We should look to: principles, information, stakeholders and consequences.

First, consider your own priority set of principles – the guides for your decisions that signal to the world who you are, how you act, and how you expect others to behave. Do they align with the candidates’ stated principles? Or are your principles (perhaps honesty, equality, integrity…) in conflict with the candidate’s behavior and policy?

Second, assess the available information. If you’re considering not voting because, understandably, you don’t know how to begin to parse all the information or don’t have time, probe whether the candidates’ actions (behaviors, policies, voting record, and positions on specific issues) align with their claimed principles – and whether any unacceptable acts make it impossible for you to vote for them (fraud, racism).

Also, ask whether the candidate exhibits drivers of contagion of unethical behavior. Examples in the political realm include: greed, pressure, failure to listen, abuse of power, demands for loyalty rather than diversity of views, arrogance, and manipulation of social media.

Most importantly, ask whether the candidate values truth. Any evidence of a disregard for truth should be a deal breaker – not a reason not to vote but a reason to vote for the other candidate. Compromised truth is, in my view, the greatest global systemic risk of our time because it infiltrates and catalyzes so many other risks from climate change to foreign manipulation of elections.

Falsity spreads and undermines trust. The candidate’s close advisers, supporters and staff are also likely to find themselves tangled in a web of contagion – starting with an inability to speak out to correct untruths.

If you strongly agree with the candidate’s policies (or you’re a single-issue voter) but find their behavior abhorrent, ask yourself: Would I tolerate this same behavior from a friend? Would I stand by and allow someone to treat my spouse, partner, or child the way this candidate treats people? How would I feel if the CEO of the company I work for, or my direct boss, displayed these behaviors?

If you’re still considering not voting, stick with the framework for two more steps: stakeholders and consequences.

We are never the only stakeholders in the ethics of our decisions, whether taking the car keys away from a friend who drinks (or not), wearing a mask (or not), or voting (or not).

In democracies today, we have a responsibility to look at the stakeholders and consequences beyond our own countries – people whom we will never know, foreign and domestic policy of other nations, the climate, extremism, pandemics and beyond. Voting is a signal to people around the world that if they cannot vote, or express themselves freely where they live, those of us who can will keep them front of mind.

Voting – or not – is a statement of who we are as a nation. If we all vote, and integrate the candidates’ ethics into our choice, just imagine the collective raising of ethical standards we would elect.

With the midterms less than a week away, some people may still be deciding who to vote for. In Georgia, Oprah Winfrey is campaigning for gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who may become the US’s first-ever Black woman governor. And Winfrey’s message to voters on Thursday, which included a plea that voters across the country remember their ancestors who didn’t have the ability to vote, was a reminder of how incredibly important it is to exercise that right.

“We are not powerless,” Winfrey said while stumping. “Every single one of us, every single one of us has the same power at the polls. Every single one of us has something that if done in numbers too big to tamper with, that cannot be suppressed and cannot be denied.”

But for those who have decided they don’t want to vote, even with ease of access to polling places and ample opportunities to get there, the choice to ignore an election shows that any extreme negative outcome won’t really affect you — and in a democracy, that’s both the ultimate sign of privilege and the easiest one to change.

Across parts of the US, there have been calls of voter suppression among Black and poor communities, particularly in Georgia, where Abrams is running. Current Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp has been accused of using his position to suppress votes and suspending more than 50,000 voters’ applications.

Part of the problem, at least in Georgia, is that Kemp is technically overseeing his own election. During a debate in October, his opponent, Stacey Abrams, pointed out this conflict of interest. “My father was arrested helping people register [during the Civil Rights movement] so I take the right to vote very seriously,” she said. “Under Secretary Kemp, more people have lost the right to vote in the state of Georgia. They’ve been purged, they’ve been suppressed, and they’ve been scared. The reality is, voter suppression is not simply about being told no. It’s about being told it’s going to be hard to cast a ballot…That’s the deeper concern I have.”

But the threats to voter freedom aren’t just happening within one state — they’re happening all over, with threats levied against community organizers for doing their due diligence just to ensure that disenfranchised (and, frequently, racialized) communities have access to their legal right to vote.

In GOP-held areas across the US, and even some Democratic ones, if gerrymandering (the act of redrawing district lines to ensure majority wins) hasn’t produced the results a given party was hoping for, party officials are putting up extreme barriers to voting. In fact, according to the BBC, at least 24 states have introduced legislation that makes it difficult for disenfranchised people to vote.

In Florida, 1.5 million former felons lost their right to vote under current governor and Senate nominee Rick Scott, who reversed a previous decision to grant these former inmates the right to vote.

In North Dakota, a new law demands a residential address on a driver’s license, but the law cut the rights of Indigenous Americans in the state, particularly those who live on reservations — they use PO boxes for mail, as they don’t have traditional residential addresses for their homes.

In Dodge City, Kansas, Republican officials removed the accessible polling place that the Latino-majority community historically voted at in favor of a location outside town without access to public transit. And back in September in North Carolina, the Trump administration issued sweeping subpoenas for state voter records, leaving millions of people in limbo until they retracted the writs.

But it’s not just voter suppression that’s at issue for those of us with the privilege to cast our ballots. Policies that affect racialized, queer, and indigenous communities, as well as low-income Americans, will make life worse for those whose votes have been suppressed and for those whose votes haven’t. In assuming that policies that hurt others won’t eventually trickle down to affecting us, we’re making the arrogant assumption that our position within society makes us untouchable. The truth is that it doesn’t.

Precedents set in harmful immigration policies can trickle into citizenship; queer erasure can lead to further criminalizing of all people; harmful policies that take away food and medical care from poor and disabled people will eventually cause a harmful ripple effect in the way able-bodied and working Americans access their own care.

So while we may think that not voting is an act of rebellion, it actually has the opposite effect — it tells those in power that you surrender, because you don’t particularly care about policies that may or may not touch you or your life.

“For anybody here who has an ancestor that didn’t have the right to vote and you are choosing not to vote,” Winfrey told the crowd at Abrams’ event, “you are dishonoring your family. You are disregarding and disrespecting their legacy, their suffering and their dreams when you don’t vote.“

(Photo via Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Kat Armstrong

Kat has been a writer, social media maven and mom for longer than she’s willing to admit. She’s also spent time in front of and behind the camera, interviewing celebs, politicians and acting as a producer for fashion and artistic photography shoots.

When she isn’t writing for various orgs and publications, she’s hanging with her kids, husband and French Bulldog, Peter, in Toronto, Canada.

Вопрос по английскому языку:

Variant-2I. Choose the correct word or phrase in each sentence.1. I think you had better / would better take a pullover with you.2. Sorry, I can’t stay any longer. I have to / might go.3. It’s a school rule, all the pupils have to / must wear a uniform.4. Let’s tell Anna. She could / might not know.5. Jones could / must be president if Smith has to resign.II. Rewrite each sentence so that it contains some of these modal verbs: can, could, must, have to or should (including negative forms):1. I’m sure that Brenda isn’t over thirty.2. What would you advise me to do?3. You needn’t come with me if you don’t want to.4. It’s possible for anyone to break into this house.5. The dentist will see you soon. I don’t think he’ll be long.III. Complete each sentence so that it contains might, might not, must, mustn’t, can’t or can. More than one answer may be possible.1. We’re not sure but we _________ go to Prague for Christmas this year.2. Bill cooked the lunch, so you _________ expect anything special!3. You really ________ start spending more time on your work.4. That’s really stupid idea! You _______-be serious, surely!5. You ________ realize it, but this is very important to me.6. Tell Mike he _________ take my book if he needs it.IV. Modal Verbs in the Past. Rewrite each sentence so that it contains can’t, might, must, should or needn’t.1. 1. I’m sure that David took your books by mistake.2. It was a mistake to park outside the police station.3. I’m sure that Liz hasn’t met Harry before.4. It was unnecessary for you to clean the floor.5. Heather possibly hasn’t left yet.6. I’m sure they haven’t eaten all the food. It’s not possible!7. Jack is supposed to have arrived half an hour ago.8. Perhaps Pam and Tom decided not to come.9. I think it was the cat that took the fish from the table!10. It was a waste of time worrying, after all!V. Correct any errors in these sentences. Some sentences are correct.1. It was funny that she should have remembered me.2. You mustn’t have been so unkind!3. I couldn’t have managed without you.4. I have no idea who it was, but I suppose it would have been Ann.5. Look, there’s $30 in my wallet. I shouldn’t have gone to the bank after all.VI. Complete the second sentence so that it has a similar meaning to the first sentence, using the word given. Do not change the word given.1. Our worrying so much was a waste of time.needn’tWe ____________________________________________________ so much.2. It’s just not possible for the cat to have opened the fridge.possiblyThe cat __________________________________________________________ the fridge.3. It would have been possible for Helen to take us in her car.couldHelen ________________________________________________us a lift.4.It’s possible that the last person to leave didn’t lock the door.mightThe last person ____________________________________ the door unlocked.5. School uniform wasn’t compulsory at my school.wearWe ___________________________________ school uniform at my school.