‘Stupid’ is a derogatory term for a person who appears slow-witted and might not be able to grasp simple concepts. ‘Ignorant’ refers to a person who just seems uninformed. ‘Luddites’ are people who, during the industrial revolution in England, sought to destroy the machines that they perceived as threatening their livelihood.
Today’s lesson is about city clerks in Ontario who are charged under provincial law with managing the process of municipal elections. While it might seem more appropriate to choose someone less biased as to the outcome in these elections, most city clerks take their election responsibilities quite seriously. The only problem is that if municipal electors ever took their role more seriously, the clerks would be inundated with angry voters who find how inadequate the voting arrangements are in most municipalities.
And that starts with our largest municipality, Toronto. In February this year, Toronto’s not overly effective city council took time off from berating their mayor to vote in favour of electronic voting processes to enable disabled voters an opportunity to cast a vote this fall. To nobody’s surprise, Toronto’s city clerk cancelled this worthwhile exercise because she believed there was insufficient time to implement such a program in time for advance voting this year.
Timing was why this writer—with more than 30 years experience in the computer industry that included being president and then chairman of a company that specialized in database development and high level encryption—made an appointment with the Babel City Clerk over two years ago to see if something could be done about the inconvenient municipal voting in this city. It was not a fun experience. Mind you, Babel’s City Clerk is a very pleasant and friendly person. She was gracious and interested in discussing voting and the various concerns. It was only when wrapping up the conversation that we felt knee-capped. To the question: “What can we do to help?” her response was, “Nothing.” She seemed quite satisfied with the awkward, cumbersome, inadequate, slow and vulnerable system that has been discouraging Babel voters.
While Ontario municipalities such as Markham and Peterborough have been spearheading the development of Internet voting for the past ten years, most Ontario’s municipalities still claim their concern is about security. What some city clerks might not understand is that Internet voting can be far more secure than the antiquated systems they have been using for municipal elections in recent years.
Regrettably Internet voting is not the panacea to getting increased voter participation but the easier and more convenient we make it for people to vote, the more chance citizens will take an interest and vote responsibly.
But when they go to vote this fall, Ontario voters can make up their own minds about who are the ignorant, stupid or Luddites.
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Copyright 2014 © Peter Lowry
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