It’s election day here in the province of Ontario, which means I have to go all the way to a different floor in my building to exercise my constitutional right to throw up a little bit in my mouth. But this isn’t a post about politics, it’s about the government messing with my mind.
I don’t pretend to understand how the entirety of the Ontario Election works, I just act like a computer and process the input. I’m on a voter list, which means they’ll be expecting me (but not offering me my favourite tasty beverage, because tracking that would violate a privacy law or something,) and I know this because they sent me a voter registration card in the mail.
According to the card, and this page, I’m supposed to Please remember to bring [my] Notice of Registration Card with you when [I] go to vote. Along with a piece of identification.
But what if I forget to bring my card? No problem, their website has the answer to that one:
That’s right, for the Ontario Election I need to bring the card and one piece of ID, but if I forget the card, I need to… well, bring a piece of ID.
Now, it’s quite possible that there’s a deep psychological factor at play here, and the registration card is an example of an artifact, a physical thing that’s meant to inspire action. Maybe tests have been done to prove that giving people a physical piece of paper and asking them to do a simple, specific action with it will improve overall attendance at the polling station versus just sending a basic reminder without telling people to keep it.
In the direct mail world, this kind of thing has been tested all kinds of ways. That’s why you get mail with things to scratch off, stamps to tear off and apply, stickers to affix, and so on.
I just wish I had more faith in my government that this is what’s happening here and it’s not just some unnoticed redundancy in the system. Lord knows I’m not calling the polling station to find out more.
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