People who want voter ID are wrong because they ignore the racist history of using voter ID requirements to disenfranchise voters and/or don’t understand how voter registration or ballot tracking work.

Voter ID is simply not something that will add security to the voting process but it will disenfranchise voters.

ID is already verified when registering and names are recorded when submitting ballots. Anyone seeking to cast ballots in the name of registered non-voters would need an army of individuals that won’t be recognized by poll workers and perfect knowledge of who is registered and not voting.

If a single registered voter name tries to cast two ballots that will trigger an investigation that will unravel the conspiracy. It doesn’t scale. It’s a problem made up by people who want to disenfranchise voters and is eaten up because it sounds “common sense”.

People who don’t think anonymity in voting is important lack imagination and historical knowledge. Fear of retaliation from the government, political fanatics, your family, or friends is perfectly rational and is why voting must be anonymous. This is an especially reasonable concern in an election where one of the candidates refers to voters as “the enemy within”. Consider voting for a Communist when Senator McCarthy was on his witch hunts. People are right to be scared of retaliation.

Tons of other countries require voter ID. You could say they’re all just being racist or whatever. But that wasn’t my point.

My point was — when it comes to challenging things you agree with, you write long explanations with nuance.

But when it’s things you disagree with, you say they’re “simply wrong”. That’s what I was getting at.

You need to have a consistent standard for discussion, and clearly the latter approach isn’t very helpful or productive.

I’m not calling voter ID racist. I’m saying that in the United States it has an established history of being abused by racists to suppress minority votes. This is a verifiable fact. Look at the Voting Rights Act for proof.

> You need to have a consistent standard for discussion, and clearly the latter approach isn’t very helpful or productive.

And yet you just did what you accuse me of.

Yes I did it after you to mimic you and prove a point

Right, which is what I was doing to begin with. So I guess we’re both right.