Calling All UK People

[andrewducker]

For goodness sake - don't forget to vote!

With the undoubtably incredibly low turnout, and the EU elections being largely Proportional Representation, your vote can count - get out there today and stand up for something you believe in!

Comments

[hfnuala.livejournal.com]

*mutter* PR done bloody wrong *mutter*

Still, I did my bit and voted this morning and got to work early feeling all virtuous.

[andrewducker]

Of course it's done wrong.

Personally I'm in favour of the scottish election version, with the caveat that I think that all of Scotland should be one big area, rather than dividing it into lots of litle ones.

But every version of PR has some drawbacks (I don't even know which version the EU elections use).

[hfnuala.livejournal.com]

List. What does the scottish one use - I can't remember - is it alternative vote?

[missedith01.livejournal.com]

The Scottish Parliament uses two votes, one for a candidate and one for a party. So by the time it all comes out in the wash you have constituency MSPs and regional MSPs.

Is that the same as alternative vote?

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

That's alternative vote, yes - AMS or Additional Member System.

[greengolux.livejournal.com]

get out there today and stand up for something you believe in!

In the end it felt more like standing up against the things I don't believe in - voting for the ones I don't mind too much in order to prevent the ones I hate getting into power.

[nickys.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, unfortunately.

Although a PR system is slightly better than a First Past the Post system in that respect.

[derumi.livejournal.com]

I'll never do that again, the last time I tried that, G.W. Bush got elected. Having a Gore administration censoring my music and video games doesn't sound so bad now. Next election, I'll vote for the best candidate, and take a baseball bat to any Democrat or Republican that tells me I'm throwing my vote away.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

I already did on the way to work this morning. According to the two ladies in the polling station, at 7.20am, I was their "first customer".

[cruft.livejournal.com]

Wait. What? When you're all going to get fucked with switchblades anyway?

[andrewducker]

I get a choice of switchblades, I'd be foolish not to make life easier on myself...

[cruft.livejournal.com]

But in what sense do you get a choice of switchblades? You saying you'd rather watch TV isn't going to make the sinners and whores decide they'll use the non-serrated one.

[andrewducker]

Because lots of people get to vote who are at least a bit like me, allowing us to sway things in my direction somewhat.

And because Bush only won by a fraction of a percentage and if a few more people had got off their arses he wouldn't have done.

And because Transmet is satire, not reality.

Well, sometimes.

[cruft.livejournal.com]

OK. But wouldn't they vote that way whether or not you voted at all? The only vote you actually control is your own, right? And isn't one vote smaller than the margin of error?

I think Transmet happens to get it exactly right in this case.

[andrewducker]

The thing here is that a very small percentage of the population wants to do hideous things.

And most of the nice ones think that it's not worth voting.

I can't control what everyone else does, but if I sit on my ass then I'm certainly not helping. If I and everyone like me gets out there, then we can make a difference. Especially with proportional representation, where a small number of votes can make the difference between no representatives for my party and one.

[cruft.livejournal.com]

Each of the nice ones is correct that it's not worth voting, for him or her qua individual voter. Once you get voters in the thousands, sure, it's worth voting, for the group, but still not for each individual in the group.

Given that, I think bullying all your nice friends to vote is a good tactic (I use "bullying" non-pejoratively!).

[dreema.livejournal.com]

what happens if your only belief is that they are money-grabbing, back-stabbing muck rakers who are only out for what's good for them?

[hfnuala.livejournal.com]

The you go and spoil your vote. Make it clear that it's not that you can't be bothered voting but that you won't vote for them.

[bohemiancoast.livejournal.com]

I work with politicians all the time, and most of them simply aren't like this. The current lot aren't like it *at all even a little bit*, and even the Tories mostly weren't like it. I mean, the politicians I've seen have the ordinary range of human strengths and weaknesses, they're not any more perfect than anyone else. They're constrained in lots of ways and they try to do what they think is best. There's a famous description of politics from John Kenneth Galbraith -- "Politics is not the art of the possible. It consists in choosing between the disastrous and the unpalatable"; and that's certainly been my experience.

Do they get things wrong? Of course. Do they have an incredibly difficult job, with poor pay and long hours, in which it's hard to see progress, easy to see failure, and even minor mistakes are brutally punished? No question. (Anyone who thinks MPs and Ministers are well-paid should compare their salaries with comparable ones for ordinary employment in London for people with the same skill set, and consider what their working week looks like). Does this put some people who'd make excellent and fair politicians off, so there's a tendency for the ones that are remaining to be egotistical? Perhaps, though I haven't seen much sign of it really.

Even if you do believe that they're money-grubbing, back-stabbing muck rakers, surely you must see that some of them are worse than others, and it's worth using your vote to prevent the ones who openly state views that you find repugnant getting power?

[cangetmad.livejournal.com]

Thanks for saying that! I am pretty fucking fed up with the assumption that anyone who makes an effort and tries to enact what they believe in is automatically an evil fucker out to destroy everyone's lives. What kind of destructive, fucked-up, childish view is that?

[missedith01.livejournal.com]

My vote is cast!

I hate that we won't get the Euro result 'til Sunday. However, two portions of Peter Snow is better than one, I suppose. :-)

Yours, waiting breathlessly by the swing-o-meter.

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

My vote is really big and impresses all the ladies.