Charles Hueter is an Idiotes!

Via Hit & Run an article from the New York Times Magazine: Is Voting Worth the Trouble?

Why does voting in a presidential election feel at the same time both terribly important and utterly pointless? There is a paradox here, and it is not easy to make it go away. On the one hand, casting a ballot on Election Day strikes us as a kind of civic obligation; neglecting to do so is perhaps not so serious as neglecting to file a tax return, but it is still something you feel guilty about. On the other hand, nearly half of those Americans who are eligible to vote evidently don't think that it's worth the bother. And, in a sense, they're right.

Some nonvoters, no doubt, couldn't care less about which candidate wins. (The ancient Greeks had a word for a person who is indifferent to public affairs in this way: idiotes, or idiot.)

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

I learn something new every day! And to think I've been using this in a negative connotation my whole life!

From SearchGodsWord:

Definition

1. a private person as opposed to a magistrate, ruler, king
   
2. a common soldier, as opposed to a military officer
   
3. a writer of prose as opposed to a poet
   
4. in the NT, an unlearned, illiterate, man as opposed to the learned and educated: one who is unskilled in any art

Translated Words
KJV (5) - ignorant, 1; rude, 1; unlearned, 3;

NAS (5) - ungifted, 1; ungifted man, 1; ungifted men, 1; unskilled, 1; untrained, 1

From Bill Cassleman's Medical Dictionary:

Idios, Greek, of an individial, peculiar to one person; compare idiotes Greek, a private person. Idiot and idiocy obviously contain this root. They derive from idiotes which was the word for a private person, as opposed to a person of rank and influence holding public office in ancient Greece. Hence, it was supposed, an idiotes was ignorant and stupid. The ancient Greeks were rather free in their putdowns of common people.

The rest of the NYTM piece is worth reading as a generalized "why the hell do supposedly rational people vote?" exercise, not that the idea is new or anything.

Jim Holt ends with this, emphasis in the original:

The moral, if there is one, is to vote out of duty, not self-interest. Why duty? For the simple reason that (as the Marquis de Condorcet once suggested) the more people who vote, the greater the chance of a happy result -- provided that each person is more likely to vote for the superior candidate.

Dammit, now I'm afraid to use moron, imbecile, fool, and twit to describe this guy.

On the other hand, perhaps I can now feel at home being called an idiot. I certainly don't like voting: The Austin American-Statesman, Voting, Free Speech, and Information...A Libertarian for Bush?...Whom to Vote For?.

Posted by Drizzten at September 29, 2004 10:09 PM