Can my husband find out who I am voting for in the Presidential Election?"

Olivia Dreizen Howell, the founder of a website to help women get back on their feet after a breakup or divorce, tweeted last week, “We’ve been getting this question a lot,” so she followed up with some facts. As the Washington Post confirmed with experts, the answer is simple: “No; it will be public record that you voted, but not how you filled out your ballot.”

The GOP ticket is led by a sexual predator who a jury found “‘raped’ [journalist E. Jean Carroll] as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape,’” the judge in the case wrote. His running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, has called for a national abortion ban, wrote the forward to a book that denounced contraception for making pregnancy “seem like an optional and not natural result of having sex,” and repeatedly called women who haven’t given birth “sociopathic” and “childless cat ladies.”

Meanwhile, the Democratic ticket is led by a woman who chose “Freedom” by Beyoncé as her campaign song, and has dispensed with the mealy-mouthed language about abortion rights to declare she stands for “the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body.” Her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, her running mate, has decried “weird” MAGA Republicans of the “he-man woman haters’ club.”

  • Encephalotrocity
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    2711 months ago

    Nobody can know who you voted for in the booth unless you tell them. Just that you voted. Ballots are unsigned and you place it in the box (supervised, but folded and unexamined) yourself.

    • @[email protected]
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      311 months ago

      I mean, mail in ballots are signed. At least, the envelope containing them is. There’s that.

      • Encephalotrocity
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        911 months ago

        An abusive husband could loom over the wife as they filled it in too. Is why I said ‘in the booth’.

  • @[email protected]
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    2111 months ago

    Her running mate, Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, her running mate,

    But is he her running mate though?

  • @[email protected]
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    1411 months ago

    The answer is no, BUT, if you’re that worried about it, perhaps your choice of husband is a problem.

  • nkat2112
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    3011 months ago

    Imagine how it has come down to this.

    I salute the women, minorities, and all folks who have decency and do the right thing during this and all other elections. Let’s all please be sure to vote.

  • @[email protected]
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    3311 months ago

    How is this a big question? Isn’t this common knowledge, one of the first things you learn about voting?

    • originalucifer
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      4611 months ago

      learn about voting

      these are fox news households were talkin about… they want less voting, not more

    • @[email protected]
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      711 months ago

      I’ll fully admit to being completely ignorant about voting the first time I did it. I was politically disengaged for moody teenager reasons, but my parents forced me to go to the polling station anyway. I didn’t care to vote for any of the candidates, but was also worried that I would get in trouble if I spoiled my ballot because I hadn’t paid attention in civics (again, for moody teenager reasons).

    • @[email protected]
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      1211 months ago

      Voting is not something we do everyday or for most people even every year. Sometimes Democrat and Republican primaries are held in different rooms or at different locations, So if this is your first time or that’s all you know, it’s a real question.

      • @[email protected]
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        611 months ago

        The polling places in some rural municipalities are literally Masonic lodges where they make you announce out loud to all in attendance which primary you want to vote in.

        • @[email protected]
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          411 months ago

          Wait. There are places where your primary party is not public knowledge when you vote? Fuuuck. (it’s usually a fire hall, not a lodge in my experience.)

  • Admiral Patrick
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    22711 months ago

    The big question touching a nerve this election: “Can my husband find out who I am voting for?”

    That’s one of those questions I feel like, if you find yourself asking it, you should probably get out of that marriage. (I know easier said than done)

    • FundMECFS
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      12 days ago

      The dating scene for het men has been way easier these past 5 or so years.

      The political male-female divide means that right wing women, and left wing men, are far more “in demand” among heterosexual people. (queer people are majoritarily leftwing so it matters less there.)

        • FundMECFS
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          2411 months ago

          I hate that guy so fucking much. It really disenchanted me from NZ that they literally sold him citizenship.

          • osaerisxero
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            711 months ago

            You’re thinking about it the wrong way. We should be thanking NZ for pulling them all to one central location.

            • FundMECFS
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              1911 months ago

              He’s not actually living in NZ. He just bought citizenship which allowed him to buy the native and protected lands he wanted to buy (only citizens are allowed to buy them).

              • osaerisxero
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                1411 months ago

                Yes, but that was so he could install his bunker there like all the other paranoid billionaires, yes?

                • knightly the Sneptaur
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                  1211 months ago

                  Hows the concrete industry in NZ? I imagine that sealing all those bunkers will be a priority once the rich assholes have locked themselves inside.

        • d00phy
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          511 months ago

          I certainly can celebrate that. I’m stuck reading his stupid book “Zero to One” for a work extracurricular. Can’t wait to discuss it with the EVP who chose it.

            • d00phy
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              711 months ago

              Not really. It’s not mandatory. I generally love where I work, so I signed up for this. Didn’t know this would be book 1. If the reading selection continues at this quality level p, I’ll happily drop out and go back to reading all the Bosch universe books!

    • @[email protected]
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      2711 months ago

      That’s one of those questions I feel like, if you find yourself asking it, you should probably get out of that marriage. (I know easier said than done)

      Why do you think Republicans want to get rid of no fault divorce?

    • @[email protected]
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      1511 months ago

      Emotional/psychological/sometimes physical abuse can do that to someone. Especially after the slow, deliberate dismantling of your social circle that sociopaths like to do. Add to that the stigma of being a single mom…

    • @[email protected]
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      511 months ago

      It’s not ideal. Alas, people change, and sometimes you realize you’re stuck in situations where bailing would cause undue hardship to your kids, so you try to make it work.

    • @[email protected]
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      4711 months ago

      I don’t know…if my wife voted for trump we might have impassible dispositions. I’d have to rethink some shit.

        • @[email protected]
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          2111 months ago

          I’ve said it a couple times now, conservative women are some of the most brainwashed on the planet. They’re literally voting their rights away. It’s sad cause I wish they had all the resources they need and want but they vote against themselves constantly.

        • @[email protected]
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          3211 months ago

          Older women in my family—with the best of intentions, have pleaded with me to overlook abusive, violent men at home because men just can’t help the way they are and it’s a woman’s job to forget and make peace.

          These are people that fundamentally don’t think they have a right to baseline respect in their own homes by the people who supposedly loved them most. They’d need a decade’s worth of therapy just to find their best interests, and then another to act on them.

          • TryingSomethingNew
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            1111 months ago

            And if you ask them about Bill Clinton and Lewinsky, it’s an entirely different answer!

    • @[email protected]
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      5711 months ago

      Many marriages are still fundamentally financial arrangements. Living together is cheaper, especially with kids. And when you own half of each other’s stuff (particularly when that stuff is real estate or retirement or cars) decoupling isn’t simple.

        • @[email protected]
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          411 months ago

          Getting a divorce is really cheap if you just do it yourself. If they’re capable of living together for 35 years, they should be able to manage signing a few documents together.

          • @[email protected]
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            111 months ago

            Adjusting living arrangements and insurance and other assets isn’t as easy or straight forward though. And if everything has to be intermingled why go to the time of doing the paper work.

      • Boomer Humor Doomergod
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        411 months ago

        I did estate planning with my GF because I want to make sure she’s okay if something happens to me. It cost $1000. We could have gotten the same legal protections by getting married for $150. And we’re both still paying single person tax rates.

  • @[email protected]
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    11 months ago

    The GOP ticket is led by a sexual predator who a jury found “‘raped’ [journalist E. Jean Carroll

    Meanwhile, the Democratic ticket is led by a woman who chose “Freedom” by Beyoncé as her campaign song

    Okay, but what about women’s rights to health care? Do they have legislative priorities? Which one of these candidates is willing to stack the court or assign reproductive rights lawyers to the DOJ? Any forthcoming executive actions? Policies? Anything?

    • @[email protected]
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      1511 months ago

      Was it really that hard to read the whole sentence?

      and has dispensed with the mealy-mouthed language about abortion rights to declare she stands for “the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body.”

      • @[email protected]
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        511 months ago

        declare she stands for “the freedom of a woman to make decisions about her own body.”

        Okay, so what does this means as actual policy? Is she appointing the head of NARAL her AG or is she just going to put a bumper sticker on Air Force One?

      • @[email protected]
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        511 months ago

        Because your abusive spouse/preacher/etc. can make you show your ballot, or even mark it for you.

          • @[email protected]
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            11 months ago

            a) some states are pure vote by mail. b) if you have the option of voting at home, that exact same abuser can make you exercise it.

            I used to oppose VBM because of this. Now I see it as a trade off since there are also benefits that can outweigh the problems. But a person with their eyes open should not pretend that the problems don’t exist.

            • @[email protected]
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              1211 months ago

              Which states? I am not aware of any that are solely vote by mail.

              If you wanted to, it would be easy to screw up your ballot request. Throw it out when you get it, mess up the form, forget to sign, offer to take it to the post office and never mail it… Then it’s “oh no it never came, let’s just go vote in person”.

      • @[email protected]
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        11 months ago

        Just going to preface this by saying that I absolutely do support vote by mail, it’s objectively a good thing

        However, there’s a problem that should be considered in that it can create opportunities for coerced voting either within a household, or by requiring someone to send a photo of their form.

        The former being more of a problem than the later

        • rand_alpha19
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          611 months ago

          Where should a just and equal society draw the line, though? A person’s partner can also use Life360 (or another app) to monitor their whereabouts and prohibit them from getting a job so they can’t save up money to escape - does that mean we shouldn’t have phones or that tracking apps should be restricted?

          In a country like the US, where voting lines can literally be 8 hours long and employers don’t have to pay you while you take time during the day to vote, can you guys afford to limit mail-in voting due to extremely specific scenarios in which abuse may occur?

          It appears (from my position as someone who has not been in an abusive relationship) like we could more comprehensively tackle this issue with legislation that covers more situations that are directly coercive in nature (like your mail-in ballot being tampered with, regardless of your consent).

          At the same time, I am a bit of an idiot, so I do genuinely want to read your perspective about how you think things should be. I am almost certainly not considering every avenue here, given that I lack first-hand experience with abusive relationships and have only really heard stories from friends and family (some of whom do have first- or second-hand experience).

          • @[email protected]
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            11 months ago

            does that mean we shouldn’t have phones or that tracking apps should be restricted?

            It is not my intent to equate “x has problem y” with “x should not exist” very good systems can and do get abused and misused.

            There’s a reason I started my comment with

            Mail-in voting is objectively a good thing

            All I’m saying is that maybe there should be a way for people to go back and override their votes (which admittedly could probably also be abused in some situations), or better yet, just better social safety nets to help people get out of those situations. I’m not suggesting I have all of the answers, just acknowledging that the person at the top of the thread raises a valid, if possibly overstated, concern.

      • @[email protected]
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        111 months ago

        See the discussion? VBM means you fill in your ballot at home, while your husband potentially watches. As opposed to voting with a secret ballot in a voting booth with the curtain closed.

  • rand_alpha19
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    7211 months ago

    Honestly, I love that my wife is a childless cat lady. It makes everything cheaper and easier. My life is better because I don’t have kids, and I’m happy that we made that choice together as rational adults and that we were able to agree that this is the best path for us.

    Anyone who chooses to have kids based on their values and circumstances is totally cool, whatever, as long as the kids aren’t being abused or neglected, of course. That’s your option and I respect it - someone has to have 'em.

    But if you don’t think people are capable of making the choice not to have kids and that it makes them sociopaths to not have kids, I’m pretty sure you’re just an authoritarian who either hates women or has a breeding fetish. Maybe both.

    • Icalasari
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      2011 months ago

      Considering the sheer strain on the body pregnancy and birth have, I feel like being a mysoginist would automatically qualify one for a breeding fetish

      • @[email protected]
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        11 months ago

        To be fair, not having children is hard on a woman’s body as well. Increased risks for uterine, ovarian, and breast cancers to name only a few.

        Patriarchal medical providers often don’t inform childless women of this and don’t encourage additional and more regular cancer screenings.

        They just ignore women’s concerns, sometimes until it’s too late–an all too familiar story for women and the history of medicine.

    • @[email protected]
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      1811 months ago

      Cheaper? My childless catlady wife spends a fortune on our elder cats with health problems.

      I have no problem with it, that’s what I knew I was marrying. But they certainly aren’t cheap. The vets know us like we’re regulars.

      • Null User Object
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        811 months ago

        Have you looked at the cost of day care? And diapers? Or just having a place to live with the extra necessary bedrooms? Pre pandemic I read some article that (as I vaguely remember) estimated it costs at least $100k to raise a child to 18 in the US. I imagine it’s closer to $150k or more by now. Probably way more.