I’ve been seeing a lot of election posts to the effect of “Left-wing voters don’t have to vote Liberal, just vote NDP, Canada isn’t a 2-party system,” and I’m just
Look. If you live in a riding where the NDP or the Greens or whatever your favorite party is stands a reasonable chance of winning, go for it. Vote for whoever you want. But listen. I’m in a riding where the current MP is the first Liberal MP the riding has ever had. In fact, the first Liberal MP that any riding including this city has had since the 1970s.
If you’re voting in a riding like mine
Do not vote NDP or Green.
Yeah, yeah, “Canada is not a 2-party system.” And it’s not. That’s the advantage of a parliament. In the US system, voting for a small party is a trap. If you vote for the Green party, all you’re really doing is taking away votes from the Democrats. The American Greens are too small to win, especially for President, and by voting for them you’re just decreasing the chances that a candidate you sort of agree with will beat the candidate you don’t agree with at all. Canada doesn’t have this problem on a national scale, because even if the Liberals lose a lot of votes to the NDP, so long as no party gets a straight majority they can still form a coalition to make a minority government.
What Canada is, though, is First Past the Post. What that means is that when voting for your local MPs, it doesn’t matter who came second place. It doesn’t matter if nobody got a majority of votes. All that matters is who has the most. If you’re in a riding where 51% of the people voted Liberal last time, and 49% voted Conservative, and 15% of the old Liberal voters switch to NDP for this election, then the Conservatives will win. There’s no coalitions for a local MP, there’s no “minority” local MP. The winner takes all.
So. If you’re voting in a riding like mine, where the NDP won a total of 12% of the vote last election and the Greens didn’t even have a candidate...vote Liberal. Please. I know the Liberals are bad. I know Tumblr doesn’t like the Liberals. But if you’re in a situation like mine, you have to think in terms of stopping the party you don’t like from winning. The party whose leader never apologized for comparing gay marriage to bestiality, and who’s openly campaigned with Trump-types like Ford and Kenny, who’ve been stripping the government for parts just like in the US. Please, just don’t let the Conservatives win. Trudeau is so so far from the worst option this election. Just hold your nose and do it, please. Don’t let Canada fall off the cliff like Britain and the US.