And even under the best of circumstances, voting necessarily means that some group of people will not get what they want and if severely trampled by the majority, may leave the group or retaliate. Voting can therefore only produce satisfying decisions where everyone is extremely tolerant or there is unanimity of opinion. Unanimity can sometimes be achieved if one person or group can persuade everyone else of the validity of their perspective and solution. Discussions in small groups allows everyone, even those who are not verbally adept, to express their ideas, concerns and opinions. Members of the group get a chance to learn from each other s experiences and thinking, empathise with people with other experiences and backgrounds, and gracefully change their minds as they hear these new ideas and arguments.
Individuals can offer to give of their time or wealth or to suffer a loss for the good of the group.
And people can be persuaded, inspired, loved, or counseled out of their prejudices, biases, and other rigidities or if this fails, nonviolently prevented from acting immorally. Of course a good process that ends in a vote can also have all these co-operative aspects. In fact, a good voting process may be indistinguishable form a good consensus process until the end. Knowing that there will be an up-down vote at the end often polarises the discussion. Also, if the group should develop a lynch mob or group thinking mentality , there is no avenue for an individual or minority to slow or thwart their immoral decisions.