Monday, Apr 11, 2011 by Klaus
“American Idol fans want Pia Toscano back, Stefano Langone out”
I know enough about American Idol to find interesting the above headline, which is from the Chicago Sun-Times. It would be easy enough to ascribe this little outcry to the ire of a vocal minority, but I think there’s more to it than that.
I’m not psychologist — and I’m certainly no Nate Silver — but instinct tells me that this is caused by what I’ll call the “complacent voter” phenomenon, something which is endemic to our society. That is, people will only vote if they believe they won’t win. As a result we have low vote counts that are heavily swayed by a fervent (and often fringe) minority.
So it may look like Idol fans want Pia back, but I’ll posit that they’re not the same fans who vote.
Remember this in 2012.
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