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submitted 1 year ago by throws_lemy@lemmy.nz to c/europe@feddit.de
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[-] Ooops@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You are the second person now that tries to tell me how important polls are, just because I didn't phrase it "we should stop such polls"... while I clearly then described my problem with these kind of polls.

Yes, polls make the same sense as elections do. That's exactly the reason we don't have direct democracies and people are voted for 4-5 years in most countries.

Asking people once for their opinion of Brexit to get a base line for public opinion is okay, although it's not that precise obviously but can at least tell you if a majority seems reachable. Asking them again after a few months or after important (unexpected) decisions is helpful. Asking them again and again when there is not vote or referendum happening however is worthless.

The same is true for polls about any question or general voting twice a week when the actual vote takes place in years. That's not about transparency but manipulation.

We saw exactly those kind of polls before Brexit constantly used for months to tell the story of how everything is okay and there is no reason to panic as there's no majority for Brexit. How many against voters might have been stayed home because of that bullshit?

We also see this in multiple countries right now, where no election is even close but there are new polls about that imaginary vote at least two or three times a week. This also has no informational value. It's just used for polarisation (who the fuck gives something about a +0.2% for some party years before the next election, unless it's either that party telling a fabvolous story of their increasing support or their opposition trying to scare people).

We have (more or less) representative democracies with long terms, because everything else is highly impractical. We don't need polls every few days as actual policies don't shift that quick. Those polls are only used to fine tune the latest propaganda narratives or (social) media campaigns, not to evaluate actual support of people for the policies their governments enact.

So I also don't need yet another "rejoining the EU single market" poll when there is no vote about it even planned and it's from the same polling group that screwed up their prediction for Brexit originally. Yes, I already know they magically find all those pro-EU Brits and get high support numbers for cooperation witht he EU. Didn't help them with the reality of Brexit...

If there ever is another referendum or an important political decision about pursuing more cooperation with the EU, would love to see some polls. With an emphasis on plural, and then some averaging between them and a proper analysis of the methodology and exact questions asked. Yet another YouGov online poll about "who wants to rejoin the single market" without actual details about the question and how detailed the people asked where informed about what this all entails... yeah, not thanks. Please get rid of that crap.

this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2023
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