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What They Have To Fear

© Ken Goldstein

My wife has a friend who is the secretary to an elementary school principal. The principal has the secretary type up her papers for a class she's taking. This is personal stuff, for the principal, not at all related to the school district that pays the secretary's salary. The secretary is not happy about this, and rightfully so. But she will not complain the district office and she will not complain to her union. She values keeping this job, at any cost, over standing up for her rights.

In response to a recent article I wrote about the presidential candidacy of Ralph Nader, a reader commented, "What I've learned about politics is that you don't vote for who is best, you vote for who is least objectionable." The reader agreed that he would prefer to vote for just about anybody other than Gore or Bush, but pressure from his peers and from the media have convinced him to vote for a candidate in whom he has no faith.

What do these two stories have in common? Fear. These are two people who know what is the right thing to do, they each know what choices are available to them, they each know their rights in the situation, and yet they each make a sub-optimal decision based on their fears.

The school secretary has heard the horror stories of how the lives of people who file grievances have been made miserable. She's been told of the extraordinary effort required to follow through on a complaint like this, and the odds against it being settled in her favor.

The defeatist voter has heard the polls telling him he's an outcast, part of the nebulous "other or undecided." He's a statistical blip that shouldn't even bother showing up on election day, and over 50% of the electorate won't show up. Imagine what would happen if all the non-voters actually showed up at the polls and voted for a third party. That's what happened in Minnesota, just ask Governor Ventura.

Now I don't have any problem with the school secretary doing the principal's personal typing if she doesn't mind. What I don't like is somebody complaining about their job, yet being afraid to do anything about it.

I also don't care if somebody wants to waste their vote on the Democrats or Republicans if they truly believe those parties will represent them. What I don't like is citizens being bullied into voting for candidates that they don't care for or, worse yet, not voting at all. That's not good for democracy, and it's not good for our country.