Are there any other jobs that require candidates to put on a show via debate? How completely bizarre that anyone finds this practice useful.
I’ve had interviews that are one-to-one. I’ve had ones where three staff asked me questions in a single session. I’ve had the academic panel interviews where there are 10 or 12 people present to ask questions and then watch a teaching demonstration. There have been second and third interviews. A few by phone and video, well before the pandemic would have forced these modes. But never was I placed in a room with another job candidate, and had I been, I can think of no circumstance in which cutting my competition to pieces would have boosted my chances of employment. Having interviewed job candidates, there is no situation I can think of that would have been made easier had all top tier candidates sat side-by-side and debated.
There is such artifice in presidential and vice presidential debates, especially considering that in almost every circumstance, we do not need this performance anyway. What will we learn in a debate that we have not learned about the incumbents in the last four years, or about their challengers — one of whom already filled one of the highest positions there is, and the other who has served as a senator since 2017. Why are people turning to theatrical performance instead of looking at their voting records and the news headlines we have been exposed to non-stop over the last four years?
There comes a time when it’s worth asking what role we each play in keeping some of the worst aspects of our electoral process alive. Do we need debates? No. Do we need challengers to gather signatures in local elections just to appear on the ballot? No. Do we need Registrars of Voters to be elected, political positions? No. But all these antiquated practices continue because we have not taken the time to do the hard work to make democracy more functional.
One last thought to add: do not come at me in the comments to say that there will be too many names to fit on a ballot if we don’t force challengers to get signatures. This is 2020. If we can file and pay our taxes online, there is no reason that we can’t vote online. No reason except a lack of imagination and political will.
Confronting Useless Things
Are there any other jobs that require candidates to put on a show via debate? How completely bizarre that anyone finds this practice useful.
I’ve had interviews that are one-to-one. I’ve had ones where three staff asked me questions in a single session. I’ve had the academic panel interviews where there are 10 or 12 people present to ask questions and then watch a teaching demonstration. There have been second and third interviews. A few by phone and video, well before the pandemic would have forced these modes. But never was I placed in a room with another job candidate, and had I been, I can think of no circumstance in which cutting my competition to pieces would have boosted my chances of employment. Having interviewed job candidates, there is no situation I can think of that would have been made easier had all top tier candidates sat side-by-side and debated.
There is such artifice in presidential and vice presidential debates, especially considering that in almost every circumstance, we do not need this performance anyway. What will we learn in a debate that we have not learned about the incumbents in the last four years, or about their challengers — one of whom already filled one of the highest positions there is, and the other who has served as a senator since 2017. Why are people turning to theatrical performance instead of looking at their voting records and the news headlines we have been exposed to non-stop over the last four years?
There comes a time when it’s worth asking what role we each play in keeping some of the worst aspects of our electoral process alive. Do we need debates? No. Do we need challengers to gather signatures in local elections just to appear on the ballot? No. Do we need Registrars of Voters to be elected, political positions? No. But all these antiquated practices continue because we have not taken the time to do the hard work to make democracy more functional.
One last thought to add: do not come at me in the comments to say that there will be too many names to fit on a ballot if we don’t force challengers to get signatures. This is 2020. If we can file and pay our taxes online, there is no reason that we can’t vote online. No reason except a lack of imagination and political will.
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