So people can be automatically registered for the draft, but not automatically registered to vote? Seems like bullshit.
You didn’t think the government would actually do something for you, did you?
That would be nice. It is rather demeaning to sign a paper promising to die for your country when needed, in order to get voting privileges.
Automatic draft, but notvoter registration…
Automatic registration for Selective Services, not automatic draft. That’s very different. This is actually helpful in keeping people out of prison or getting fined for not registering.
But yes, this absolutely proves that they could automatically register people to vote with no designated party affiliation.
As a European I have always been confused when Americans talk about “voter registration”. The way it works in my country is you are legally required to register your residence with the government and that registration is automatically used to determine a voter registry (just filtering by age, citizenship and exclusion due to criminal convictions all of which is information already known to the government). I always just get a letter a few weeks before elections informing me where my polling place is.
Well you see, in the United States, the way some politicians, specifically ones belonging to a certain very authoritarian political party manage to get elected is by making sure people don’t or can’t vote.
This is often coupled with throwing a huge hissy fit about “voter fraud” which doesn’t actually exist on any remotely meaningful level.
Well, voting fraud is a thing in Russia. Stuffing when one person throws multiple ballots at once, carousel when one persion votes one multiple stations, dead souls(reference to Gogol) where dead or absent people vote and Venedictov’s box - when Sobyanin repeatedly claims that electronic voting results will come immidiately when voting ends, but don’t long after all physical stations reported results.
Comparing Russian elections to US elections may as well be comparing Vichy France elections to US elections. They are quite different beasts.
Maybe, but I am more familiar Russian elections. Personal experience.
Also important note: election fraud != voting fraud. Voting fraud is just one type of election fraud. In Russia most widespread type of election fraud is not registering candidates.
you are legally required to register your residence with the government
Bit depressing.
Even in the US, you’re legally required to for quite a number of things. The most obvious being driver’s license/ID cards.
The standard is good behavior, not other people.
Also ID cards don’t require it. License’s do.
In my state, the state-issued photo ID cards absolutely do.
Yep. Same. You just go get stamp in passport once, then you just go to voting station with passport. That’s it. Oh, also by default(when you get passport) you get stamp that you live where you lived during filing.
Just because the politicians want to grab you out of your life and use you as cannon fodder doesn’t mean they want to actually be as accountable to you as they’re supposed to.
Politicians voting for mandatory draft should be on the frontline. Pieces of shit.
Why do they always send the poor?
Seems like a pretty good Common Sense legislation really. You already have to register by law so making it automatic would be easier for all of us and avoid anyone getting in trouble for something stupid. I don’t see a downside to this. I would like to see it apply to voting registration too however.
Haha good one…voting registration is not exactly in vogue these days.
Well, voting registration as it’s implemented in America isn’t exactly in vogue. As in “oh, you just need to get an ID to vote from now on.” And people without ID need to do some extra paperwork and the office is open 5 minutes every other week, just go through the door located behind the acid moat and bear traps.
Over here in Finland: Government has a comprehensive record of citizens, they know where everyone lives and who’s eligible to vote. So they send you a letter. “Here’s how to do the advance voting, here’s the polling location you need to go to on election day, Also here’s how to draw the numbers, so this will be less confusing. Just bring this notice card with you. And an ID. If you don’t have an ID, visit the police station and they’ll give you one for free.”
In Italy, you have to travel to whatever city you have residence in to vote. A lot of (mostly progressive) people have to fly across the country to cast their vote, apparently it sucks for them
I might catch hate for this but I never understood why it wasn’t automatic the entire time since it’s illegal to not register.
It was not automatic so rich people can avoid it. I have never heard of someone facing criminal charges for failing to register. I have heard that failing to register can impact eligibility for college financial aid and scholarships.
I have heard that failing to register can impact eligibility for college financial aid and scholarships.
And this is why I hate the fucking neoliberals so much. As bad as the conservatives are they don’t expect me to agree with them, they just want my money. Neoliberalism demands that you not only pay a shit ton of money for student loan debt that you also internalize that you deserve to because you were privileged. They have developed economic original sin
Easy way to funnel the lazy into prison labor?
Not any more at least. Prior to this bill, failing to register for Selective Services was a felony punishable by imprisonment for up to five years and/or a fine of not more than $250,000.
Now you’re automatically enrolled. I think it’s actually better this way.
Eh, military service now is 8 years right? I’d take jail and file bankruptcy. At least you’ll be alive instead of cannon fodder, and it’s 3 years less.
We were always forced to register. The fine and imprisonment were penalties for avoiding registration. You’d be registered at the hearing as well as facing consequences.
At least you’ll be alive instead of cannon fodder
I don’t think the military is dying at a noticeable rate, especially as “cannon fodder.” A quick Google says deaths by hostile action hasn’t broken the triple digits annually over the last decade. I also didn’t really look at the other deaths, so feel free to dive into that side.
https://dcas.dmdc.osd.mil/dcas/app/summaryData/deaths/byYearManner
This is about the draft. We haven’t drafted in forever either, but you can bet if they draft it’s because cannon fodder is needed.
if they draft it’s because cannon fodder is needed.
That’s a big if, as you noted US hasn’t drafted in forever. But even if they did draft, the US hasn’t used “cannon fodder” tactics for several decades. Their technology is so advanced (and military budget/spending so high) they don’t need to in order to win. Trench warfare ain’t really a thing anymore.
We haven’t drafted in 50 years. That’s nothing
I’m catching a vibe you didn’t read the initial comment you posted to.
It should be automatic, and it is now. Why did I have to worry about it 40-years ago? Now? Now worries, done deal. Nothing has changed.
Of course lemmy thinks that serving means you’re on the front lines as a grunt with an M4.
Might as well be. Giving a gun to a murderer is as bad as pulling the trigger, and that’s what supply officers do. Mechanics fix killing machines. Cooks feed killers while they’re off killing. The military is a machine, and every cog in that machine is a murderer.
I was given a draft card with my financial aid package for undergrad.
Applying for FAFSA was a required part of the application process for public universities and most private ones, meaning that nearly all amabs applying for college were automatically enrolled by this process…
until they simplified FAFSA in 2020, which I just learned about when acquiring the link above as a citation.
This bill would reinstate and expand automatic enrollment to amabs who don’t need FAFSA or who don’t want to go to college.
So they are trying to change the conditions for automatic enrollment from “has a penis and wants to go to college” (precovid) to just “has a penis”.
Remember kids, you can be a draft dodger and be president 😎👉👉
Which would be fine if said draft dodger wasn’t a chickenhawk.
Things are only bad if Donald Trump does them.
No, it’s also bad when Rush Limbaugh and Ted Nugent do it.
I’m for this. Don’t vote for war mongers when you or your kids or grandkids could be drafted for war.
Unfortunately there are no non-warmonger candidates in r or d and voting third party is a vote for trump so I guess we’re all fucked amiright
Naw I’m good, thanks.
You’re already legally required to manually register with the selective service if you are male and you turn 18.
Why not just introduce legislation to end that requirement altogether.
AFAIK this is only required if you apply for financial aid for college.
That’s transphobic. Trans women shouldn’t have to sign up for the draft.
yeah, it sucks. heres a good essay on that issue
And sexist.
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I’m not male but I did register for the draft when I turned 18. I remember doing it on my taxes as weird as that sounds.
I know I’m not the smartest fork in the kitchen, but how are they able to just pass this when it should be something we get to vote on?
The US is a representative democracy, not a direct democracy. You elect representatives to represent your interests. Or these days, you elect representatives to not represent the other people you don’t like.
Thanks for the reply that helped :)
I mean if you wanna argue that that is the way it should work, I guess we could have that conversation.
(Way too many people I know won’t keep themselves informed enough to vote on representatives, let alone understanding every individual bill well enough to vote on those.)
But if you’re under the impression that that is how it currently works, I guess all I can really do is recommend you take a civics class or something cause that’s wild lmao
Prove to me right now that the average congressional rep knows everything they vote on as much as they should.
Prove to you a thing you just made up that nobody said?
I’m go with nah.
Fine don’t. Continue to believe that Moscow Mitch is better informed and makes wiser decisions than a well read 15 year old.
Technically, the USA already required you to sign up for the draft right around the time you received your Social Security Card. The draft has not been used since 1973 and earlier. So this basically has no adverse effect. Even if a draft happened all the same people who would have been drafted before will be drafted now.
You’re required to sign up within 30 days of your 18th birthday. You should have (well your parents anyway) a social security card within the first year of your life, strange outliers aside.
It’s still technically a crime knowingly not registering, with a $250k fine, even if it hasn’t been prosecuted in decades.
It also bars you from federal government jobs, many federal programs, and grants. Until 2020, it also barred any federal financial aid for education, but that’s changed now.
You should have a Social Security Number when you are born as a citizen of the USA. You register for your card when you turn 18.
Your parents received your ss card after you were born once your SSN was assigned.
You register for the draft when you register to vote.
I’ve definitely had my social security card since I was like, 12. Before that, my mom had it. Definitely, 100% did not get it at or around 18
The draft has not been used since 1973 and earlier
One thing I found as I’ve gotten older is that history gets shorter and shorter the older you get.
1973 was so recent bro you have no idea. It was within one human lifetime. That’s really close. That basically just happened.
I don’t really get what point you’re trying to make.
They’re saying “I’M OLD AND TIME’S MOVING FAST SONNY BOY”
I don’t even think he’s over 69 I think he just wants to say the Draft is some impending doom we should be worried about, but at this point if a draft occurs it will probably be for something pretty important.
If it’s important draft everyone then. Not just the men
Sure, sounds good.
Your sense of time is too short is what’s being said.
I’m sorry I don’t measure recent events in a span of a hundred years.
Trading bodily autonomy for voting isn’t right, especially when half the country is not only exempt but fights any attempt to make it more equal.
Defending only yourself isn’t right, especially when you want all the benefits with none of the costs.
Men are the only ones paying this cost in the US
Again, there hasn’t been a draft in 51 years, all of our current armed forces are volunteers and about a fifth of them are women. If you want to extend the draft that is fine but it sounded more like you were opposed to the draft entirely.
American men are supposed to sign up for the draft when they turn 18, this new bill would make that an automatic process.
I think it’s called selective service
Yes, it’s called the selective service, but it’s colloquially known as draft and that’s what above was referencing
I like how you got downvoted for rehashing 16bit when all they did was repeat exactly the same thing me and the article headline said and still got upvotes.
Disagree, just make the draft also affect women so it’s not sexist
But a village of 50 men and 50 women might be able to survive with 40 of those men dead. It most likely won’t survive with 40 of those women dead.
This is why, when shit is so bad that we’re drafting men to fight, we need to let the women stay home if they choose to.
You can always let immigrants in as long as you win the war
Good news for you, I guess… this includes making women sign up.
Not what the article said
Are you implying we should blindly accept Yahoo News as a reputable source for all information and disregard everything else?
For one, I think this was already required. I remember having to enroll in selective service.
For two though, whoever calls another draft is dead in the water. It’s commonly accepted that starting an actual draft is political suicide.
That said, it would be nice if we could codify that and ban the draft.
Yeah, honestly as long as we aren’t willing to change things in a meaningful way, this is somewhat nice. It’s like voter registration. It should be automatic (assuming it’s required anyway). Sadly we are more likely to make draft registration automatic before voter registration.
You are required to sign up but they usually only can enforce it in ways such as applying for a driver’s license or voter registration. Maybe more kids aren’t applying for drivers licenses and therefore aren’t signing up.
if you never sign up you’re excluded from a number of government jobs such as at the post office.
That would make sense, I never pay attention but it would make sense why so many applications ask about it
It’s bonkers that you have to actively sign up for it. Canada had conscription on the books as an available tool but like… you never actively signed on or were penalized for not doing that paperwork. In 2021 they ended all mandatory military service and two months ago they removed conscription entirely. Not that it’s possible for conscription to not come back as technically it’s not actively banned, but if it did it would have to be written and implemented as law entirely from scratch and be re subject to the full process of new constitutional challenge and could now be subject to gender discriminations to strictly men as required by current civil rights .
There’s something about coercing someone to sign their name to paper to register for conscription that feels wrong to me that just accepting a call to conscription doesn’t. Like they want to reduce your resistance to it by making it “voluntary”.
Many people don’t pay attention. My mother (63) didn’t know me or my brother were egistered when a conversation came up about it last year. Most people are so complacent in accepting every day life because they are worried about living day by day. The concept that a mother who is legally responsible for 2 kids didn’t know they both signed themselves to serve in the military at 16 is baffling from a stand back and look at it mentality. (Only two kids, both sign to give their life away while her and her husban(my father) are the only ones who legally could sign our lives away at that age.)
Yup. Bonkers.
