Why I Don't Vote

Karen called me into the office.

"It's come to my attention, Greg, that you have no intention of voting."

"Oh, brother. Are we really going to have this conversation?"

"I think it's important! The whole staff is voting, and yet you're not going to!"

"Yeah..."

"But we need to know who has the best Halloween costume!"

"Well, great. I understand it needs to be done, or whatever. But everyone else is voting. Why do you need me?"

"Because it's important that you vote! It's your DPL duty."

"I just don't like being part of large groups. It's why I don't clog dance."

"What?"

"Look, if we have just, say, four of us on staff voting then I'll consider doing it."

"Four?"

"Yes," I sniffed, "call it my Rule of Four. We get a staff member from each department and each demographic so we have a fair sampling. They're selected randomly within those departments and once summoned they must vote, just like jury duty. Then they'll get to meet each Halloween costume contestant personally and judge without the interference of emails from downtown and cookie bribes."

"Only four? We have fifteen people on staff here. That's not enough."

"Sure it is. We'll have one librarian, and one clerk, and then Donovan, the black, and we'll have Jonah who's the Hegelian. We need a Hegelian in any voter system."

"Did you just call Donovan, 'the black'?"

"And we need an old, too. That would be me." I smiled.

"But what about all the staff members who are now denied the vote?"

"They'll be glad. What a relief not to have to do anything! And they'll have to abide by the results that me and Donovan and Jonah come up with. It's much more efficient that way."

"I don't like it. If you have your way, we'll have someone win like this:

"So?"

"It's dangerous! We can't have a dangerous lunatic win our Halloween costume contest. What if she names Reggie as her clerk assistant??"

"Well, we'd all learn something important about stuff. And stuff."

"Greg, you really are a jerk."

"Heh heh. Yeah."