LGBTQ+ Rights Worldwide

Depends on the country. In France, they are ignored utterly just like abstention is, only "valid" votes count.

Therefore, they're both equivalent to a vote for the greater evil.

Didn't know that. We can turn in blank ballots here and they're counted. I would agree with mandatory voting so long as the right to turn in a "none of the above/abstain" is allowed.

That requires setting a minimum threshold of expressed votes (ballots cast for one of the registered options, excluding "none of the above") to consider an election/referendum valid. If no such threshold is defined, replacing abstention with blank ballots will change nothing.

It does change the behaviour of people that are abstaining despite having clear political opinions, though.

And yet, we have that over here. Most of our voting is pure electronic.

As it stands now, regardless if someone fills in a spot or not, it's counted as blank. So let's say there are five things for me to vote on. I vote in 4 of them and refuse to vote in the fifth. They still count my fifth vote as empty, because they have to count my 4 votes. Obviously, leaving it blank is a conscious abstain, so it's not any different. It all depends on how you want to word it.

We had a local school board election have to be redone because no one voted for the position. So they just advertised it again and had a special vote for just that position.

More people could get in on the race that way and they had a few more debates.

If bum-fuck Arkansas can do it, then other people can as well. Pakistani, Egyptian, and other countries have the same results with paper ballots. It's not difficult. You just have to care enough to let people know that's an option. Frankly I think it as obvious, but then again, I'm not like most of the citizens down here so I have to check myself.

My state had the second-lowest voter turnout in the 2014 elections. We got this guy in the governor's office as a result

What I'm saying is "If the rule is 'candidate/option with the most expressed ballots gets elected/chosen', it doesn't matter whether those who are dissatisfied with the options abstain or vote blank, since the number of expressed ballots for each candidate/option stays the same." Only if there is a rule of "If there are too many abstainers/blank votes, the election is invalid" will either option really change the result (by invalidating the election). Depending on how you word that rule, the protest vote of choice will be abstention (cast/registered, ie turnout), blank (expressed/cast) or it won't matter (expressed/registered).

I figured that was a given.

Again, if Arkansas can do it with our ballots that are mostly electronic and the freaking Pakistani people can do it with paper and corruption rampant, then other places with better resources and more educated citizens in general really have no excuse.

Yeah I think normally blank ballots are counted as spilt over here, so the same as if you drew a penis on your ballot.

Well I dont like voting but the prospect of drawing penises on the ballots now has sparked my interest in it.

We can call this enhanced democracy Dongocracy.

edited 6th Apr '15 3:43:56 PM by Aszur

I'm sure there's some sort of phallusy here.

We will push, and push and shove the ideals of dongocracy until it fits into the tightest places of our society. We will stroke fiercely the fires of passion that the freedom of dongocracy allows. A pure, clean, white tide from our efforts will wash out the corruption and the bile of all other forms of government. We shall erect the proudest, longest form ever known to mankind.

Men of all races will lie back and enjoy the long standing freedom of relying on other dongocracy loving men and in turn they too will toil and sweat for their fellow men in the laws of dongocracy.

We will toil hard to rub out any flaws, letting them be spent and forgotten, wiped away clean and forgotten about in order to look to the next day, the next morning, knowing that dongocracy will stand as firm as always.

It will be glorious.

edited 7th Apr '15 7:44:10 AM by Aszur

Cue slow clap...

Ok everyone, pack up and go home. Aszur has won the internet and is now our new overlord

Go, Team Costa Rica!

I have a doubt.

Considering that transgendered people have, essentially, a brain-body mismatch, and considering that the sex drive is one of the most powerful impulses in nature, how do they manage to fulfil themselves sexually? Certainly it isn't the same if you're physically a man but mentally a woman, or vice versa, and you manage to fulfil yourself, and celibacy is generally a hard thing (heh heh) to ask for from people who are not... austere.

A lot of them feel unfulfilled sexually until they get things sorted out, in part because things down there don't work how their bodies tell them to work. And honestly, sex drive matters varying amount for varying people and tends to matter the least to people who are already depressed about something else. Many people are celibate most of their lives without doing much more about it than complaining about it a couple of times.

They date. They experiment. They have casual sex.

Just like heterosexual cisgendered people do.

My buddy who is now almost completely through his transition started trying to date guys, then realized he was really into girls. So he identified as a lesbian and dated girls. However, though this he realized that something was still wrong and off, and he came to the fact that he was born the wrong gender.

So, he officially is undergoing his sex change and it all makes sense now why he couldn't really be in a fulfilling lesbian relationship because he is not a lesbian.

Many people confused or still sorting themselves out are more open to dating alternative sexualities or gender fluid people. That is just how it meshes sometimes.

My being bisexual has actually had some people who were questioning their gender spectrum want to date me because they felt safe to invest in a relationship knowing that I would be supportive regardless. While this is good for finding friends, this should not be a basis for a romantic commitment, so I never entertained their advances.

...I don't think you understand.

I'm not talking about how they find companionship, or love (I don't think that's different, obviously; everyone has to struggle for that). I'm asking about fulfilment as sexual beings without the body parts which the brain expects to have, but the body doesn't. It isn't a question I ask of you, Gabrael, as a bisexual person, because you, as a sexual being, are comfortable with who you are and what your body is; the whole conundrum with transsexual people is that they aren't.

Again, they experiment. They have sex. They have a variety of sex with different sort of partners and see what works, doesn't, and keep trying.

Sometimes it works, sometimes doesn't.

It's not difficult.

So apparently there is a law in Egypt that permits them to put homosexual foreigners in jail and deport them.

Because you are too gay to go watch the obelisks.

LINK IN SPANISH ONLY

El Salvador approves constitutional reform that would effectively ban all forms of gay marriage, deeming marriage an institution only allowed "between a man and a woman thus born".

It still remains to be ratified, however and it might happen on the first of may on the next reform, though it needs 56/84 votes for it to pass.

Sad thing is my country is full of this sort of mentality too. The cringe.

That would also drastically affect transsexuals with that specific language...fuck.

It definitely does. I am glad my translation got that through.

In my country, however link in spanish also a MtF trans person was given a new ID card that identified her as a woman, instead of a man. This because she was tired of having to explain why it appeared as a man for every time she had to use it.

The change was not easy though, it took a judge's ruling for this to go through as no amount of visits to the civil register would yield anything.

I am glad the law allows this, but I am aware that the common people are not akin to this mentality. The comments and the "BAWWWWWWW" from the fundies are hilarious though

So here in Ireland our same-sex marriage referendum creeps slowly closer, and a few days ago both sides started putting up their posters. Of course the No side immediately starts spreading misinformation as to what the referendum is actually about. One of their posters links surrogacy to the referendum, which has literally nothing to do with surrogacy.

You guys heard of these fuckers? They appear to be going to great lengths to promote anti-gay laws, lawmakers, and lawyers, on a worldwide scale.

These guys need to be stopped and disrupted at every stage.