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comment by ghostoffuffle
ghostoffuffle  ·  2461 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: The Trump Administration Is Planning an Unprecedented Attack on Voting Rights

    A YouTube view I liked recently was a couple people walking around NYC asking black people what they thought of that argument that forcing a driver's license/ID requirement meant to disenfranchise black voters. The responses were mostly, I have an ID, why would that be hard because I'm black? Maintaining ownership of a birth certificate is just part of being an adult.

HACKTYUALLY... maintaining ownership of a birth certificate is just part of being a young to middle aged urban adult. Rural folks? Older rural folks? Black older rural folks? Not so much.

Obligatory NPR transcript

I just tried to find an account I read one time of an older black lady from the rural south trying to get an ID when she'd been born in her childhood home and never obtained a birth cert. I couldn't. I don't even remember the source. Coulda been here. But in looking I did find an interesting paper suggesting that not only was that account not special per se, but actually pretty common for folks of a certain age. I'm posting it separately for you to peruse. TL:DR; not everybody has a birth certificate, and it's not their fault, and painting their lack of ownership as somehow irresponsible or not "grown up" is misguided.

Even discounting the whole birth certificate issue, getting an ID isn't necessarily the easiest thing in the world. Oh god in the two seconds I took to give you some evidence I found this other article looky har

Bottom line: ID laws absolutely tilt the scales against certain populations. Not populations that you might readily identify in YouTube videos polling youth in NYC.





user-inactivated  ·  2461 days ago  ·  link  ·  

So if young Urban voters are more likely to have IDs and also to vote Democrat then why do they fight the laws which would disenfranchise the opposition constituency?

I mean, I know it's not altruism.

ghostoffuffle  ·  2461 days ago  ·  link  ·  

What makes you think that poor rural black folks vote Republican

also read the links I posted in my above reply

user-inactivated  ·  2461 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Nothing, but there are a ton more young urbanites than rural black. Just there concentration of people can tell you that. 80.7 percent of the country is urban.

ghostoffuffle  ·  2461 days ago  ·  link  ·  

follow-up: what beyond a YouTube straw poll informs your understanding of the logistical difficulties faced by those currently lacking ID

Did you read the links

user-inactivated  ·  2457 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I read the links. While the anecdotal evidence of people who have trouble getting IDs is there, they conflate a couple of things. especially the difference between having an ID and having a driver's license. To this point, they examine the case of 'who drives' for a good portion of the NPR article as if that answers the question of who would be disenfranchised by these ID laws, but from Ballotopedia: As of June 6, 2017, 33 states had enacted voter identification requirements. A total of 18 states required voters to present photo identification, while 15 accepted other forms of identification. So to imply 'who drives' is important is roughly false. And I like NPR, I'm just saying that this report is off in that regard.

Moreover, they never really answer the questions that they set out to answer: Who doesn't have IDs and why? I would like a rough number of how many people are actually being disenfranchised from voting here. If it's millions in a state, that's not a cost worth any benefit, but if it's a hundred per state you can start to argue for or against it.

And again, I think voter ID laws are stupid wastes of time and money meant to address a problem that doesn't exist en masse in voter fraud. But I don't agree that getting an ID of some sort should be considered an unbearable burden. In Missouri, for example, as long as you are a registered voter, you can just bring in your registration with your name and address on it. I just brought that in, even though I had my ID on me. That kind of ID doesn't seem burdensome.