Fabiana Perera
Why I Vote: Fabiana’s Perspective (BU Washington Staff)
By Fabiana Perera
Fall 2012
The very short answer is that I vote because I was born in New Jersey. When you are born in the US (say in New Jersey, for example) and grow up knowing that you can vote and maybe hearing that voting is useless or time consuming or inconvenient, you forget that
voting is a privilege afforded only to those who are citizens of this country. Thanks to the generosity of the writers of the US constitution, my parents’ careers, and the outstanding staff at Saint Barnaba’s Medical Center in Livingstone, NJ, I was born in the US and thus afforded the privilege to vote even when nobody else in my family can.
Less than a month ago my sister spent hours in line in Caracas, Venezuela, to vote in a presidential election that she believed could change the direction of the country. Venezuela has been governed by Hugo Chavez Frias since 1999 and though he holds regular elections, he always wins. Still my sister -and indeed over 80% of the country’s voters- showed up to vote . Some did it because they thought their vote counted. Some did it because they firmly believe that if you don’t vote, you have no right to complain. Some voted because they thought that this time someone else was going to win. And indeed, 55.08% of the people voted because they wanted the same guy to stay in power for six more years. Being a majority rules system, that 55% won.
Today I stood in a very short, very organized line and voted in the US again. I voted in Washington, DC, a tiny non-state whose three electoral college votes went to Obama in 2008 by a margin of 93% to 7%. If there is a place where your vote “doesn’t matter”, it’s here. However, having lived in a country where voting is ten times harder, where the feeling that your vote will not be counted is twice as real and twice as intense and the outcome of the election practically known in advance, I went to vote. And I always will, even if I move somewhere more blue (if that place even exists) or a true red state.
It’s easy to take for granted something that was given to you just for being born. Unless you have an opportunity to compare. When people apply to be US citizens they can be asked a number of questions (10 out of a possible 100, to be exact) two of which are: “one is one right of US citizens?” and “what is one responsibility of all US citizens?” The answer to both is the same: voting. It’s your responsibility, yes; but it is also your right. Though I was never asked those questions, I vote because I know that I have the right to and because having seen what voting can be like, I feel responsible for that right. I vote because it’s a fantastic perk of being “from” New Jersey (by way of Venezuela).
Fabiana Perera is a former Program Manager for BUDC. She left the program in the Summer of 2014.
