...is the sort of thing said by people who don't watch the news and because of that are unaware of the number of manual re-counts that are done each election.
In a fair system with over 300 million potential candidates, how likely would it be that a father and his son would both be elected as president (as was the case for George Bush junior/senior)? What about the Clintons? When we factor in the empirical evidence, how can we still think that one vote out of hundreds of millions make any difference at all?
I once looked up the personal histories of U.S. presidents. It was about 50% candidates who came from well-connected families (like both Bushes or FDR), and about 50% candidates who rose from seemingly humble beginnings (like Clinton, Truman, Eisenhower). It crosses party lines; both Carter and Reagan had humble beginnings.
Have you run for office yourself? You might feel differently about votes if you did. The field of candidates is only limited at the end. At the beginning, as you point out, it could be anyone.
And logically, a high volume of votes can't disprove the value of a single vote. If a single vote did not have any value, neither would a high volume of such votes!
But if a million votes are worth something, then each vote must be worth something too.
If all 300 million people lived identical lives and had identical histories, then the chances are about one in 300 million.
In the real world, people who take specific life paths, get specific degrees, and acquire specific skills are more likely than others to end up in a particular place. Especially when the other 299,999,999 people get to weigh in on the decision.
Just as not every one of those 300 million people has an equal chance of becoming a database administrator at Google, and not every one of those 300 million people has an equal chance of becoming a barista.
Except when you start preaching that idea, then you are part of the masses that think that way, and hence the minority of people who do vote, and who do not represent the majority opinion, are the ones that influence the outcome.
If everyone thought like me, then society would churn through governments like toilet paper and life would be better for people like me who only stand to benefit from change.
What's wrong with not voting? If you're a regular person, it takes a lot of time and energy and you get nothing out of it. One vote never made a difference.
I don't buy the argument that "If everyone thought like that, then it would make a terrible difference"... This statement is bullshit because the premise is false to begin with; most people will not think like that because most people are sheep and will vote for whoever the media tells them to vote for.
The people who buy the rhetoric that their vote makes a difference are the same people who buy all the bullshit propagated by the political media.
If someone is suggestible enough to accept the premise that one vote out of hundreds of million makes a difference, then surely these people are also easily influenced by other kind of media. It's very far fetched.
If you're a thinker, then your vote can never compete against the masses who just follow the media.