If you want to include information about disliking candidates, you can include a "none of the above" option, which allows voters to star or rank candidates below "none of the above", effectively making those negative votes, because if "none of the above" wins, you re-run the election and none of the candidates who were on the ballot are allowed to stand again.

For example, with star voting + "none of the above", you could have voted 5 stars for your favourite candidate for president, 4 stars for "none of the above", one star for anyone else who isn't Donald J Trump and no stars for Trump, meaning that you supply very little support for the other not-DJT candidates to make it into the second round, but if it's Trump vs anyone, you still get to vote against Trump being president. By voting 4 stars for "none of the above", you get to raise the likelihood that the election is re-run if your favourite is eliminated, and hopefully your party stands a more popular candidate next time.

[–] chaogomu@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

You have a slight misunderstanding here, which is my fault for not explaining the system.

STAR can handle any number of candidates because it's a Cardinal system. Meaning that you count the ratings independently. You can rate as many candidates as you want at 5 stars. Or Zero stars, or anything in-between.

That right there is the reason it's immune to the spoiler effect.

It also makes it, not immune to tactical voting, but resistant? Tactical voting exists, but using it actually gives you worse results. Your best results come from just being honest with your preferences.

Which is almost unheard of in voting systems.

Every other major voting system penalizes you for being honest.

[–] davidagain@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago

It's unclear to me what you think I have misunderstood.

(The fractional voting system penalizes you for being dishonest, but it's not a major voting system and doesn't pass the person-in-the-street trusts it test.)