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Last Sunday, one of my good friends called me up and asked if they could go over their mail-in ballot with me to discuss who to vote for. Conflicted over current events and the behavior of some of the candidates on the ballot, they hoped that I could settle their decision-making process and simply tell them who to vote for. Much to their surprise, I replied, “Just pick someone, and vote for whoever you want!”

In today’s hyperpartisan America where so many people distill their worldview through the caricatured lens of Left vs. Right, Democrats vs. Republicans, or Fox News vs. MSNBC, telling people to “just vote for whoever you want” comes as a shock.

But here in Hawaii, our combination of isolation from the mainland, small number of electoral college votes, and solidly Democratic voting patterns actually gives us a wide berth to vote for anything and anyone we want.

Every election year, self-appointed political experts love to apply peer pressure and suppress others from voting their conscience by saying things like “don’t waste your vote by voting for someone who doesn’t have a chance” or “don’t vote for third parties, because they’ll spoil the election by stealing votes.”

This stab-in-the-back legend loves to invoke as examples the 1992 presidential election where Ross Perot  (if you’re a Republican) or the 2000 presidential election where Ralph Nader  (if you’re a Democrat).

In reality, neither Perot nor Nader cost Bush or Gore their elections; the losing candidate just didn’t resonate well enough to achieve a majority in states where the electorate was almost evenly split. .

Here in Hawaii, however, where 38.2% of the population chose to vote Democrat compared to 9.7% Republican in this year’s mail-in primary, you won’t be “stealing” the thunder of either faction’s partisans at the national or local level any time soon if you vote for whoever you like.

On our general election ballot, over and above the Democrats and Republicans, you will also find candidates of the Aloha Aina, American Shopping, Constitution, Green, and Libertarian parties, as well as nonpartisans. This plethora of voting opportunities captures the entire spectrum of beliefs and policies, so people who don’t feel completely satisfied by the platforms or personalities of the Democrats or Republicans should seize this opportunity to break out of the mold and choose someone else.

Let’s be honest. Hawaii’s  aren’t going to boil the political ocean over for Donald Trump or Joe Biden, and to me it’s a blessing to not have to live under the politics of a battleground state. Either candidate will win or lose entirely on his own merits or defects, and here in Hawaii, we can vote based on our vision rather than someone else’s political war.

As for our Legislature, Republicans are already such a micro-minority on the verge of extinction that one might as well already consider the Hawaii GOP to be on the same electoral tier as the third parties that run as faithful opposition every election year. In fact, it might even be worth electing a couple of third-party candidates to the Hawaii Legislature instead, to create a “Neapolitan” division in the government that would force a different conversation than the usual Team Blue vs. Team Red arguments we’ve grown so tired of.

If you haven’t yet turned in your mail-in ballot, I want to give you permission to be yourself for once and find just the right fit, rather than the lesser of two evils, in this year’s contests.

One of the most disappointing things to witness election year after election year is seeing people who don’t like the major parties or major candidates shoe-horning themselves into voting Democrat or Republican just because they feel they “have” to support either faction. You as an individual owe absolutely nothing to the personalities of either major party, and apart from you broadcasting on social media who you voted for, no one in your circle of family, friends, or coworkers will ever actually know who you voted for if you vote differently this year.

If you haven’t yet turned in your mail-in ballot, I want to give you permission to be yourself for once and find just the right fit, rather than the lesser of two evils, in this year’s contests. If you absolutely must vote Democrat or Republican, then please continue to do so. But know that the greatest feeling in the world is being your own person, free of the restraints of cognitive dissonance and forced conformity, where you can use your vote to empower what empowers you, rather than someone else’s vision of grandeur.

As a born again Christian believer and a conservative, I am perpetually surrounded by people who tell me that God “commands” me to vote Republican, and I am often accosted online by absurd social media personalities – that’s Danny-speak for “false prophets” – using profile images of the dove that landed on Jesus at his baptism telling me that I have to support President Donald Trump.

Whatever. I seek “God” in prayer every day and I have not yet experienced an epiphany of seeing Jesus Christ attending a ReOpen Hawaii Now rally or wearing a MAGA hat.

What I have seen, however, is that for too long we have become stupid about voting when we conform ourselves to other people rather than voting for what we want. This election is your chance to think different and be different. Vote your conscience.