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Fed up with party politics too?
Posted by Epicharis • 6/08/09 • Subscribe to this Discussion [RSS] • Report This Topic
Topics: democracy, political parties, politics, voting
British politics has gone a bit crazy lately...every time you turn on the news someone else has quit the government or launched a scathing attack on the PM, and now people are getting so fed up with the main parties that they are voting for fascists!
I've written a post about what I think is the main issue with politics (too much focus on PR and personality) if you fancy a gander:
siuilaruin.wordpress.com/2009/06/08/smoke-and-mirrors/
Do you think that politics has become more about image and internal power struggles than the people that the politicians represent?
Or do you think that photo ops and party politics are valuable to democratic society?
User Comments
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Just me then? You Americans don't think that you'd rather know that Obama was working than be able to see him ordering hamburgers? No one got an opinion?
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I'm totally with you. It's for this reason I always tell people "I'm not really into politics."
Not because I don't care about the issues, but because I don't care about what we generally perceive as 'politics.' To me, it's the grown-up form of gossip, and no better than celebrity news tabloids.
Who said what where with who? I don't care! I'm interested in numbers and facts.
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Doesn't this belong in "political discussions"?
I read your post and I happen to agree with you. Too bad that is not the way most people perceive it. More hamburgers!-
I wasn't sure because I'm shamlessly promoting...
hmm...I want a hamburger now...
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Politics has always been about something other than the people the politicians represent. Unless of course the people they represent are themselves and their cronies.-
It hasn't ALWAYS been like that. But yes, for the past few hundred years it has mostly been about other interests.
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Siuil, just for curiosity's sake-since I confess great ignorance of history-when do you think it was ever otherwise?
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In Every nation there has been a different experience. In the UK there are periods dotted around where the interests of the people are being served better than the interests of those in charge, whether it's a monarch doing it or a parliament. My late modern history is shaky (because it's not on any school syllabus and hardly on any university courses because that's when governments got things done), but the mediaeval and early modern periods have a fair few examples of governments that work for the benefit of the people.
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"“Permit me to issue a nation's money, and I care not who makes its laws." -
I became fed up with party politics after 1997 when I realised that although we had got rid rid of the Tories we hadn't really.
I will not participate again until I see a viable alternative to the corporate whores who now decide policy.
Give me a party who will stand up to the city, promise to remove all American bases from British soil and govern in the interests of the poorest members of society and they will get my vote until then they can all go fxxk themselves.-
but...but...you mean you don't vote?!!
That's how the BNP won 2 seats in Europe and 3 council seats! Because less that 30% of the population voted! You have to vote...if you don't vote you lose your right to complain because you didn't participate in the process that makes up the government! -
Nope I refuse to vote it just encourages them. I have withdrawn my vote in protest and I'm eagerly awaiting revolution.
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That's incredibly stupid.
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Well we can't all be as clever as you.
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What is your not voting achieving? We're in a democracy, if the people who don't like the government decide to abstain from voting then the government won't change. If you don't like the main parties then vote for a fringe party, and if you don't like them then why don't you stand yourself? Doing absolutely nothing when you have the opportunity to vote and then complaining that nothing has changed is ridiculous.
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_dice_are_loaded
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My non vote achieves exactly the same as my vote would, absolutely nothing.
So I choose not to participate in the sham, if you find that to be ridiculous and incredibly stupid that's your prerogative. I might find your naive faith in democracy ridiculous and incredibly stupid but of course I wouldn't be rude enough to say that. -
Reminds me of this:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbliI2w-6a0
If more than 30% of people had bothered to vote we wouldn't have members of the BNP and UKIP on councils and in the European Parliament. Are you fine the fact that these people now have some power and influence? The idea that saying "I have no faith in politics so I'm not going to vote" is a reasonable stand-point is utterly baffling to me. If the 70% of people who couldn't arsed or who were protesting and so didn't vote had turned up and voted for the fringe party they most agreed with we'd have a very different country. Your apathy is not laudable. -
I wasn't aware that I had said I had no interest in politics. I have actually been to prison for political reasons so attempting to patronise me with comedians don't really wash.
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I wasn't trying to patronise you, you really reminded me of that. Why on earth are you willing to go to prison for politics but not vote? Why are you awaiting the revolution? Why don't you get involved? If a British Nazi party can get organised enough to start winning seats then what's to stop you from doing something? If you hate them all then do something, don't just pretend that by refusing to participate you are actually achieving anything but letting in anyone who can be bothered to try.
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You are really more naive than I thought if you actually believe that voting will change who controls the country.
Do you really truthfully believe that if everyone in the country voted for a party that stood against everything the establishment stood for they would actually be allowed to take power?
You seem to think that the democracy thing is some great free competition that anyone can win, when in actuality it is just a red/blue puppet show to keep the "children" happy. You want to participate in that fair enough but don't castigate me for not wanting to join you. -
You honestly think that I'm the naive one when you think that voting just encourages them and doesn't do anything else?
Obviously the system is flawed, but deciding to have nothing to do with it won't change that. If the 70% who didn't vote on Thursday or the 50% who didn't vote last general election decided to vote for the BNP do you think this country would be the same place? Voting does change things, but maybe the reason why it's always Labour/conservative is because half the population don't vote at all. I'd love to put your theory to the test and see what would happen if all the abstentions voted and somebody completely different won. If you really wanted a change you'd vote for someone else and campaign for them and be a real challenge to the people in power. It's very easy to sit at the bus stop and grumble, but it doesn't actually do anything, does it? -
"if you don't vote you lose your right to complain because you didn't participate in the process that makes up the government!"
I really dislike when people say things like this. The right to complain is a first amendment right that does not hinge on us having to cast a vote. Nowhere does it say "you MUST vote in order to contribute to politics", and I'm very glad for this. -
We don't have a constitution in Britain.
I firmly believe that if people won't participate when they have the option to that they lose their right to criticise the government. Some people in the world haven't got the right to vote or participate in their political structure, but where people do they don't bother out of apathy or 'protest'. -
"red/blue puppet show"
Yes, that's it
Reminds me of the following story:
www.michaeljournal.org/myth2.htm
“Oh great Mammon! I feel your banking genius coursing through my entire being! Oh, illustrious master! How right you were when you said: `Give me control of a nation's money, and I won't mind who makes its laws.' I am the master of Salvation Island because I control its money.
“My soul is drunk with enthusiasm and ambition. I feel I could rule the universe. What I, Oliver, have done here, I can do throughout the entire world. Oh! If only I could get off this island! I know how I could govern the world without wearing a crown.
“My supreme delight would be to instill my philosophy in the minds of those who lead society: bankers, industrialists, politicians, reformers, teachers, journalists — all would be my servants. The masses are content to live in slavery when the elite from among them are constituted to be their overseers.”
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Oops
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i dont know how
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Yes. -
politican parties are an UNnecessary evil
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hehe...what shall we have instead?
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the rough part here in the US is that if you are not in line with the the center-right Democratic party. Or the far right republican party, you're basically out of luck. Your president is either going to be a Feuillant or a Feudalist
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Ah sod it! I'm starting a commune in Jersey!
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lol. Maybe in the UK you have more choices...
...or just multiple fascist parties?
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Here's what James Madison had to say about political parties etc.
"In every political society, parties are unavoidable. A difference of interests, real or supposed, is the most natural and fruitful source of them. The great object should be to combat the evil: 1. By establishing a political equality among all. 2. By withholding unnecessary opportunities from a few, to increase the inequality of property, by an immoderate, and especially an unmerited, accumulation of riches. 3. By the silent operation of laws, which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity, and raise extreme indigence towards a state of comfort. 4. By abstaining from measures which operate differently on different interests, and particularly such as favor one interest at the expence of another. 5. By making one party a check on the other, so far as the existence of parties cannot be prevented, nor their views accommodated. If this is not the language of reason, it is that of republicanism." -
"Perhaps he should have been a civil servant rather than a politician"
If only that was what we EXPECTED politicians to be
I understand your frustration. Political coverge has become more like celebrity gossip. We get to hear about our Associat SC Justice designate and her broken ankle for god knows how long
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