Open Letter to Torontonians who are not planning to vote tomorrow

Dear fellow citizens who are planning not to vote:

I assume you're planning not to vote because none of the candidates whom the media has arbitrarily deemed viable strikes you as acceptable.

So here's what I want you to do: vote for someone interesting, regardless of whether you think they have a chance to win.

We are a diverse, complex, nuanced city with dozens and dozens of candidates for the position of mayor alone, and the media has not been reflecting this. That does us all a disservice, and is most likely ultimately the reasons why you aren't hearing of any candidates that sound acceptable.

To combat this, to show the media - and the world - that we're more complex and nuanced and interesting than they're treating us as, everyone needs to pick someone interesting and vote for them. It could be someone with a fantastic platform. It could be someone whose pluck and audacity in running for public office you admire. It could be the candidate who actually answers your questions on Twitter. It could be the candidate whose platform is of most benefit to you personally, without regard for the greater good of the city.

"But they have no chance of winning!" So? It's not like you were going to vote for one of the people who does have a chance of winning. Besides, there's no penalty for voting for someone who doesn't win.

"But there's so many candidates, I don't have time to figure out who's best!" You don't have to figure out who's best, you just have to figure out who's good. You already have a nose for who's bad (or you wouldn't be choosing not to vote), so pick someone who isn't bad, who you think is better than the people whom the media has deemed to have a chance at winning. If you don't vote, the best candidate definitely won't get your vote. If you do vote for someone who you think is good, the best candidate just might end up getting your vote.

"But I don't have a full sense of the issues, I can't make a fully informed choice." Because you're considering not voting, you're obviously savvy enough to determine when a platform is unacceptable. So read the platform of the candidate who interests you and make sure it's acceptable. By voting for someone whose platform you find acceptable, you're making the statement "See, this is the sort of thing I'm looking for."

To get you started, here's a Twitter list of all the non-frontrunner mayoral candidates who are on Twitter. And here's where to find all the candidates for all offices. Pick one who's interesting and has an acceptable platform, and vote for them. Help show the media and the world that there's far more to us than this false binary they've boxed us into.