this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2025
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Swiss voters on Sunday decisively rejected a call to require women to do national service in the military, civil protection teams or other forms, as all men must do already.

Official results. with counting still ongoing in some areas after a referendum, showed that more than half of Switzerland’s cantons, or states, had rejected the “citizen service initiative” by wide margins. That meant it was defeated, because proposals need a majority of both voters and cantons to pass.

Voters also heavily rejected a separate proposal to impose a new national tax on individual donations or inheritances of more than 50 million francs ($62 million), with the revenues to be used to fight the impact of climate change and help Switzerland meet its ambitions to have net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

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[–] SARGE@startrek.website 78 points 1 day ago (7 children)

Is Switzerland full of sexist people who think "someday I'LL be rich so I don't want to tax MYSELF more, hypothetically maybe in the distant future"?

[–] trxxruraxvr@lemmy.world 68 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Afaik, Switzerland is a very conservative place. So that pretty much aligns with what you said.

[–] Kirp123@lemmy.world 56 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They are so conservative that women got the right to vote federally in 1971. In one Canton they only got the right to vote at the local level in 1990 after a Supreme Court decision. They were the last Western Democracy to do so.

[–] atomicbocks@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Native Americans didn’t get the right to vote until 1975… unless you are counting the 1990 thing they weren’t the last.

[–] IzzyJ@lemmy.world 9 points 23 hours ago

I want to be part of a normal species

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 28 points 1 day ago

Sexist is debatable but... yeah

But everyone worshiping the rich? Yeah, that is Switzerland in a nutshell. A decade or so ago I spent a week in Switzerland on holiday and... even the state funded museums kinda felt like "And then so and so developed a really cool technology that saved countless lives. AND THEN THEY GOT RICH!!! FRANCA FRANCA BILS Y'ALL!!!! And here is what they bought with it and the house they lived in and how much paper it takes to print out their monthly statement and... Oh, the tech? Whatever, nobody cares about that"

[–] Tryenjer@lemmy.world 5 points 20 hours ago

It's no coincidence that they are notorious for being a tax haven for unsavory individuals with shady dealings.

[–] wildbus8979@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 day ago

Does the earth revolve around the sun?

[–] butwhyishischinabook@piefed.social 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Yes. Europe isn't the magical forward thinking land it's made it to be lol. Well, most of it isn't, anyway. Still a great place to spend some time though.

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[–] oxysis@lemmy.blahaj.zone 64 points 1 day ago (19 children)

If men have to sign up for the draft then it is only fair that women have to too. It’s unfair that only men have to risk being drafted and losing so much of their life to war.

[–] EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 15 points 21 hours ago

As a general rule, I oppose gender roles codified into law.

[–] Barrington@feddit.org 11 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

Personally, I think having a draft is a terrible idea regardless of gender.

They voted down adding women to this already bad idea. Potentially in the future, they remove the draft altogether.

I guess my point is, why would you want them to make the situation worse just so it is equal?

[–] remon@ani.social 7 points 8 hours ago

Potentially in the future, they remove the draft altogether.

Support for mandatory military service in Switzerland has been going up in recent years, so I wouldn't count on it.

[–] JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago

Removing the draft is never on the table.

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[–] kandoh@reddthat.com 33 points 15 hours ago (6 children)

Insane that any democracy would reject an inheritance tax

[–] wooffersyt@lemmings.world 8 points 4 hours ago

Most workers have been conditioned to fight tooth and nail for their oppressors.

It's really sad.

[–] Ibisalt@lemmy.world 6 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

the problem how i understood is, that we are not only talking about cash money but also money that is in businesses. family owned businesess may then be forced to sell their business to shareholder owned foreign corpos, because they could not afford it due to the tax. that sparked some major fear among voters. the result was not even close, it was 78% No! thats hughe and beyond any left/right worldview, not a single canton voted yes, that alone is a clear indicator that this bill was not very well-thought-out

[–] nyctre@lemmy.world 1 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago) (1 children)

Not that insane. Most people only concern themselves with their own issues. And if you're a 40 year old whose childhood home is now worth 500k or whatever and you have to pay 200k in taxes in order to inherit it, then you probably want to vote against it because otherwise the government will take it.

Okay, take all that with a grain of salt because I'm not too familiar with inheritance law, but it's based on multiple similar stories I've heard from people.

I still think it should be taxed, don't get me wrong. But I understand why people are against it.

[–] SmoothOperator@lemmy.world 10 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

The text indicates that it's only on inheritances greater than 62 million dollars

[–] nyctre@lemmy.world 3 points 8 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

Yeah, it's true that in this case most people would never have to care about that. When I replied I was thinking about inheritance taxes in general. My bad.

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[–] ObtuseDoorFrame@lemmy.zip 17 points 1 day ago (1 children)

It feels very strange to be a US citizen and actually be able to judge another country for making a silly conservative decision. Woo?

[–] telllos@lemmy.world 8 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago)

I think, the initiative was rejected by all parties,but probably for different reasons. If you look at the position of the parties in this table

Edit: this is the position of the left

[–] LegoBrickOnFire@lemmy.world 14 points 22 hours ago

What is not well enough reprensented in this post is that the Service Citoyen was not only about makimg women do a mandatory service. It was to transform the outdated and regressive mandatory service for men into a more general service to the collective that treated security not as a entirely militaristic issue but as a wholistic one.

Now parliament will interpret this as a mandate to cull the existing useful civil service and force every men (and potentially women too) into the military.

[–] Leomas@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The takes on here are wild as a Swiss dude.

[–] Leomas@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Hint: Mandatory service is a problem.

[–] Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

Mandatory service is not a problem. As long as we live in a world with countries like russia mandatory service does more good than harm.

[–] Leomas@lemmy.world 1 points 10 hours ago

Mandatory service causes two main issues (for me): Bad, undisciplined armies and authoritization of the population.

[–] Cybersteel@lemmy.world -2 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

It is. Get with the times it's the 21st century. Modern men are equipped with better social tools and technologies to be able to tackle any problems that come their way without resorting to savagery that is violence. There's diplomacy, economic sanctions as well as international agreements to get Russia to stop what they are doing with a strongly worded letter. The sword may seems sharp, but nay the pen is mightier than the sword. Yet, it is men's fragile ego that prevents them from searching alternative solutions other than wanton violence. Oh Vritra, if we could eliminate all the men if the world, the world would a lot more peaceful, as the remaining people eat their crumpets and sips on their tea.

[–] BrowseMan@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago)

Hey! You lost this:

*Hand over a "/s"

[–] remon@ani.social 2 points 9 hours ago

That's a wild take ....

[–] SlartyBartFast@sh.itjust.works 6 points 14 hours ago

I thought everyone had to serve. Sad.

[–] ilinamorato@lemmy.world 3 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

As an American, I have no room at all to judge this decision. But

proposals need a majority of both voters and cantons to pass.

That sounds amazing. Let's do that, please.

I mean, straight popular vote would probably be better. But this could really do what the Electoral College stans say that it was made to do, without doing what it actually does.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 11 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

That sounds amazing.

It sounds arbitrary and heavily weighted to favor the smaller cantons. Same problem we have with the US Senate and the filibuster. Representatives for a meager 30M voters can obstruct policy championed by the other 300M

[–] ilinamorato@lemmy.world 3 points 16 hours ago

Anything even slightly better than the idiocy we have seems amazing to me, apparently

[–] aldhissla@piefed.world 3 points 1 hour ago

ITT: people judging the vote and the voters by the magnanimous title alone.

The initiatives were worded and implemented so poorly, that it wouldn't surprise me if the initiants wanted to lose both these votes.

  1. The inheritance tax would have caused mass nationalisations and it had pegged the tax proceeds to go towards climate goals instead of let's say the federal pension fund deficit (AHV-Loch). It would be incorrect to state that the voters don't support an inheritance tax or climate goals based on this vote.
  2. The "service citoyen" proposal would have made some kind of civil or military service mandatory for all, but would have essentially reduced the military to a volunteer force, which would be socially unacceptable. The Swiss have a historically repeatedly confirmed will to keep a citizen's militia as the country's only security force.
[–] jazzkoalapaws@ttrpg.network -1 points 1 day ago

Bunch of morons.

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