Oh absolutely, this is me just lambasting Labor and the LNP, and lamenting that people seem to think One Nation is a better option…

If anyone will listen to me, please vote left wing (my preference being the Socialists, and the Greens if that’s not palatable for you).

100% with you about the teals, they’re the Liberals except not as completely uncaring. They still hate workers, but at least they believe LGBT+ should have rights and climate change is real. I do hope they keep filling the Liberals niche, but more positive.

All this being said though, it bears mentioning that just because our voting system is decent*, doesn’t mean it’s terribly democratic. Money and lobbying massively influences who gets funding for campaigning, what laws end up getting watered down, how much time people have to engage (due to work hours, pay and insecure work) and what messaging is put in front of voters.

The problem is capitalism at its core, but I will grant our method of voting is one of the best in the world. Could be better though.

*issues with being able to win I think an unacceptable amount more seats than is reasonable compared to actual preferred support, due to single member electorates in the lower house. For an extreme example, if you get 51% of the 2PP vote in all seats, you get 100% of the control of the lower house - I prefer expanding the lower house by 50% and having 3 membered electorates in the lower house. I’m not for much larger electorates though, because we already have that in the senate, and forming government would become too difficult (see Tasmania).