When I started writing for The Reflector back in the fall of 2016, one of the first articles I wrote argued for the validity of voting for third party candidates in national elections.
In fact, I took my own advice and voted third party in the 2016 presidential election. After a couple years of a President Donald Trump leading the country and realizing the ramifications of a close election, I now realize my previous viewpoint was idealistic at best and naive at worst. The sad reality of American politics is, it is absolutely dominated by two parties. If the 2016 election, which sported two of the worst candidates this country has seen in decades, could not make a third-party candidate even remotely relevant, it stands to reason the two-party system will never change. 
Let me put this into perspective. According to Christopher Klein of the History Channel, Theodore Roosevelt in the election of 1912 still holds the record for third party votes with his Bull Moose party. Even at the peak of third parties’ relevance, it was still only enough to split the vote of the Republicans, and lead to an easy victory for Woodrow Wilson.
This is the most any third-party candidate has ever been able to get, as arguably the next most successful one, Ralph Nader, essentially accomplished the same thing by paving the way for former President George Bush to narrowly defeat Al Gore in the 2000 election. With this said, I still stand by the idea that we should be able to vote for more than two political parties without wasting our vote, but I now realize we would indeed be wasting our vote by doing so nonetheless. It is simply too idealistic to think the system will work any other way in the reality we live in. 
The 2016 election showed yet again why voting third party can potentially be ruinous. I did not, and still do not approve of Hillary Clinton, but having her in office right now would be beyond preferable to the complete embarrassment we have there now. I am not sure if it would have changed the outcome if everyone would have cast their votes for only the two major parties, but I believe it would have had a strong chance of doing so.
Most people I know, including myself, who opted for third-party candidates did so because they hated the idea of both Clinton and Trump, but the majority of those people were against Trump much more. From this conclusion, I can determine us idealists are partially responsible for the situation America finds itself in today.
Matt Laslo for The Guardian stated during that election what I wish I would have thought about at the time, “This isn’t the year to mess with a third-party vote – since no third-party candidate is going to win, all those votes might do is prevent a Clinton victory, putting the GOP meltdown front and center in global governance.” We might as well call Laslo a prophet, because that is exactly what has happened. 
It is just irresponsible to vote third party in situations where the wrong person being elected could cause so much damage. I am not the type of person to ever be okay with having my choices limited or being forced to pick my poison, but the 2016 election showed me it is better to make an impact in a direct way than to simply using my vote to protest.
I would love to see a change in this country, so that all Americans can truly choose who they actually identify with on a political level without wasting their vote. I wish the contents of this article were not true, but they are, and it is better to face facts than live life fooling yourself.