Election season is drawing to a close, but awkward celebrity public service announcements urging ordinary citizens to vote are back in full force; and they couldn’t be more futile. Last week, actors from Marvel’s Avengers (among other unremarkable celebrities) recently assembled to educate voters about the dangers of staying home on Election Day. In a more recent video, actor Jesse Williams shared the same message. I’m sure Robert Downey Jr. and friends are well-meaning, but while they maintain that “every vote counts”, they are drawing on a disproportionate amount of influence they have in a democratic society due to their cultural significance.

While we all matter, as Mark Ruffalo posits, we don’t all matter the same, as the video with over 7 million views at the time of writing demonstrates. This wouldn’t be a problem if they actually made a case for their preferred candidate. In fact, the closest anyone came to doing so was Martin Sheen proclaiming that “we cannot pretend both sides are equally unfavorable.” In other words, it’s worth your while to pick a Giant Douche over a Turd Sandwich, to steal a crude metaphor from the latest season of South Park. And as an added incentive, if a “Giant Douche” is elected, Ruffalo will appear nude in his next film.

Isn’t this all rather insulting?

The two frontrunners are perhaps the least desirable in electoral history, however, there is a case to be made for exercising one’s democratic right, if only for the sake of exercising it. Gary Johnson is in the running, after all, and is a strong third party candidate for libertarians and disillusioned voters alike. The political process isn’t entirely useless, as Johnson and Ron Paul have demonstrated by using their platform to bring libertarian ideas to a larger audience. That said, there’s an equally important right to abstain from voting, and whether one abstains as an objection to an understandably disappointing political system or simply because they have something better to do, it’s absolutely beautiful.

Ninety-three million eligible citizens did not vote in the 2012 presidential election. That’s ninety-three million people who decided to forgo the opportunity cost of learning about the candidates and waiting in line to cast a ballot that will have almost no bearing on the result of the election. Perhaps they spent time with their families, worked on a project, developed their passions, read a book, or binge-watched House of Cards. Any of these seem like more rational choice and would arguably result in a greater net gain to society than fulfilling one’s “civic duty.”

Robert Downey Jr. reminding normal folk of their civic duty

The mythology behind arguments for voting is extensive. There’s the view that not voting is lazy, but isn’t voting for someone with the hope that they will change the country on someone else’s behalf the truer display of laziness? And of course, there’s that cliché: “if you don’t vote you can’t complain.” On the contrary, to vote is to legitimize the democratic process, so it follows that one must accept the victor as the rightful representative of the people (of course this rebuttal is only relevant if we’re in the business of policing what people can complain about). Finally, there’s the myth that “this time it’s different” — that some calamity will ensue if the wrong person is elected (as expressed in the aforementioned celebrity PSAs). Some things will change, but ultimately whoever sits in the Oval Office will very likely be subject to the same incentives and influences that corrupted his or her predecessor.

Voting is simply a form of activism, and comparatively speaking, it’s not very effective. Political change is spurred by creators, communicators, and consumers. Politicians respond to change, they don’t engineer it. Taxi cartels are losing power because of the introduction of popular, superior alternatives such as Uber and Lyft, not because some city councillor suddenly grew a conscience after decades of regulating the industry. The list goes on: Abolitionist movements preceded the abolition of slavery, the prevalence of pot in popular culture and opposition to the War on Drugs have led to its legalization, and so on. There are some merits to voting, but ultimately you cannot popularize an idea and shift the Overton window from a voting booth. If you want to change minds, then build something, say something, or write something. Voting should be at the bottom of the list.

Political apathy can be beautiful. When I see a low voter turnout, I see people who would rather focus on their careers, their children, or their passions instead of the bad reality-TV show called the political process. These heroic abstainers would rather engage in peaceful, productive activities rather than choose which of the two awful candidates they’d rather rule over their neighbors — surely, that is something to celebrate.

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