THIS THANKSGIVING MONDAY IS THE EVE OF THE FEDERAL ELECTIONS IN CANADA.
THIS POST IS SERVING AS A REMINDER FOR EVERYONE TO GO OUT AND VOTE TOMORROW.
HENCE ALL THE FRIGGIN' CAPSLOCK.
DON'T FORGET!
OCTOBER 14TH, 2008 IS ELECTION DAY!
GO AND VOTE!
VOTE!VOTE!VOTE!VOTE!VOTE!
Showing posts with label the vote. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the vote. Show all posts
Monday, October 13, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Vote, Damn You!
So, it's that time of... not quite four years again, and we've been asked to paddle our butts down to a polling office and cast our votes.
The available choices are something that I've been known to whine about. But the actual act of voting has always figured fairly high upon my list of priorities. It's not like it takes a lot of effort or anything... and when it comes down to it, it does make a difference... (a small part of a big difference?).
Once upon a time, back when I was ages 12 through to 18, I was so raring to vote... blame Mike Harris, the premier of Ontario for the larger part of the '90s. All's I really remember was: I was a gallery brat. Therefore, I knew the pains of the art communities during those years. The no-funding deals. Or, you know, the basic slash funding, programs.
But there was more. I remember my mom pointing out posters (they really made no difference in our small Ultra-Con towns) that stated: "Minimum wage $6.75, Monthly welfare payments $695, Mike Harris' political advisors' hourly wage $495". Or, you know, something along those lines. I might have forgotten the specific numbers by now (I think I have, because I remember the hourly wage being higher than the monthly welfare rate). Point is, at that age, I was already indignant and angry about PC Politics.
Oh, yeah, and to add salt to that wound... there was also that minor incident of the new curriculum. And the glorious day that we went to listen to Nelson Mandela speak at the SkyDome (now known horrendously as the "Roger's Centre"), and Harris came out to speak first. And a SkyDome full of angry 11 and 12 year old children booing him.
Long story short: while most of my friends were more into their Nintendo systems, I was so ready to cast my vote. I actually spent the 14-16 years reading books about Suffragettes (probably one of the reasons that people called me that dirty ol' f-word, you know... feminist). In Highschool Civics class (the bullshit "understanding the political system" class that Harris' new curriculum added) I railed against the unjust laws that required me to be 18 before I could vote - 16 was more than mature enough! (Of course, my classmates thought I was an utter nerd, and the teacher kind of hated me).
The point of this long, rambling story is that voting is a responsibility I feel is very, very, very important. And even if you're voting for the dirty Con Party and their head corporate robot Harper (can you tell I'm biased in favour of the the lefties?) the point is, you're voting. And that is important.
The sad thing is that I feel like most people in my generation are still no more interested in being involved than they were in highschool. I know numerous young, university educated people who refuse to vote because: "Oh, it just doesn't matter." "What has the government ever done for me?" and "My guy never wins." And we wonder why there are so few young people trusted in government. A mixture of laziness, apathy and plain old ignorance allows so many people to "justify" why they just shouldn't vote. One friend told me that she creates change through other actions. But activism, however important, shouldn't be constantly necessary. Instead, why not just try to elect a responsible government that responds to its populous? Hell, what's a walk to the polling office compared to having to organise protests or incite the revolutionary mob?
I'm sick of people who go on and on about how the world is going to shit and then, if you ask them if they voted, they say "Oh, well, my vote doesn't count for much". No, it doesn't count for much if you don't use it. It'll count for a hell of a lot more if you were to just use your vote.
I think that one of the reasons that the advertisements for the respective parties (*cough* Conservatives) have gotten so completely trashy (ie. no political message, just slamming the other guy, like, you know, the "Gamble on Dion" series?) is because people are just shutting off to actual issues. We don't want to talk about, don't want to deal with it, and don't want to take responsibility of it.
And don't even get me started on how the American Election '08 is going.
The available choices are something that I've been known to whine about. But the actual act of voting has always figured fairly high upon my list of priorities. It's not like it takes a lot of effort or anything... and when it comes down to it, it does make a difference... (a small part of a big difference?).
Once upon a time, back when I was ages 12 through to 18, I was so raring to vote... blame Mike Harris, the premier of Ontario for the larger part of the '90s. All's I really remember was: I was a gallery brat. Therefore, I knew the pains of the art communities during those years. The no-funding deals. Or, you know, the basic slash funding, programs.
But there was more. I remember my mom pointing out posters (they really made no difference in our small Ultra-Con towns) that stated: "Minimum wage $6.75, Monthly welfare payments $695, Mike Harris' political advisors' hourly wage $495". Or, you know, something along those lines. I might have forgotten the specific numbers by now (I think I have, because I remember the hourly wage being higher than the monthly welfare rate). Point is, at that age, I was already indignant and angry about PC Politics.
Oh, yeah, and to add salt to that wound... there was also that minor incident of the new curriculum. And the glorious day that we went to listen to Nelson Mandela speak at the SkyDome (now known horrendously as the "Roger's Centre"), and Harris came out to speak first. And a SkyDome full of angry 11 and 12 year old children booing him.
Long story short: while most of my friends were more into their Nintendo systems, I was so ready to cast my vote. I actually spent the 14-16 years reading books about Suffragettes (probably one of the reasons that people called me that dirty ol' f-word, you know... feminist). In Highschool Civics class (the bullshit "understanding the political system" class that Harris' new curriculum added) I railed against the unjust laws that required me to be 18 before I could vote - 16 was more than mature enough! (Of course, my classmates thought I was an utter nerd, and the teacher kind of hated me).
The point of this long, rambling story is that voting is a responsibility I feel is very, very, very important. And even if you're voting for the dirty Con Party and their head corporate robot Harper (can you tell I'm biased in favour of the the lefties?) the point is, you're voting. And that is important.
The sad thing is that I feel like most people in my generation are still no more interested in being involved than they were in highschool. I know numerous young, university educated people who refuse to vote because: "Oh, it just doesn't matter." "What has the government ever done for me?" and "My guy never wins." And we wonder why there are so few young people trusted in government. A mixture of laziness, apathy and plain old ignorance allows so many people to "justify" why they just shouldn't vote. One friend told me that she creates change through other actions. But activism, however important, shouldn't be constantly necessary. Instead, why not just try to elect a responsible government that responds to its populous? Hell, what's a walk to the polling office compared to having to organise protests or incite the revolutionary mob?
I'm sick of people who go on and on about how the world is going to shit and then, if you ask them if they voted, they say "Oh, well, my vote doesn't count for much". No, it doesn't count for much if you don't use it. It'll count for a hell of a lot more if you were to just use your vote.
I think that one of the reasons that the advertisements for the respective parties (*cough* Conservatives) have gotten so completely trashy (ie. no political message, just slamming the other guy, like, you know, the "Gamble on Dion" series?) is because people are just shutting off to actual issues. We don't want to talk about, don't want to deal with it, and don't want to take responsibility of it.
And don't even get me started on how the American Election '08 is going.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Voting and not Voting
"The Daily Telegraph carries the results of a poll which suggests that more young people have voted in reality TV shows than are likely to vote in the next election.
The paper says fewer than 42% of first time voters think they will vote for a political party, yet 46% have already voted for contestants in shows like Big Brother and Pop Idol."
Source BBC News.
That is disgusting. But I think you could make an easy comparison to the US and Canada both.
I am meaning to write something about how our electoral system isn't working. It's not that voting doesn't work. It's just that our candidates all have somethings in common, with few exceptions: They are either businesspeople or they are lawyers. They are all living well above the median. There is something wrong with that picture. First off: I trust a businessperson less than I trust a lawyer, unquestionably. Second off: most of the time businesspeople and lawyers have about the least "hard life experience" in that they are rarely from impoverished backgrounds, single mothers, visible minorities, etc. Thirdly: most businesspeople and corporate lawyers (social lawyers are sometimes actually quite wonderful people) have vested interests. Bias doesn't disappear because it's not right on the surface. Friendships don't end just because So and So doesn't work directly for the company anymore... Businesspeople are trained to have one thing prioritized: the bottom line, at all costs.
I think that if we ever want real results in our government, we need to start electing educated people who have lived among the majority of people (ie. low income bracket). I think that we also need to stop electing businesspeople, especially. I think getting real results in elected government would stimulate the interest in actually participating in the electoral process. I think it would also begin to stimulate positive change within our society - we have to start deciding what's more important: the fullness of people's lives or the fullness of our "GNP".
Speaking of which, there was a interesting segment on CBC's national about Bhutan wanting to remain under an absolute monarchy rather than move towards a democracy. I won't make much discussion about this... I really don't know much about Bhutan at all, but the latter part of the video talks about the king promoting "GNH" (Gross National Happiness) rather than GNP (Gross National Product). Now, of course, issues are always more complex than that, and much more complex than shown within the video. But the idea of promoting the happiness of the people rather than the average wealth (which isn't a very good way of calculating how well people are faring within any given country. Here is a link to the video, if you're interested. It's only about four minutes long, and it's definitely worth discussion and attention. And of course, if (I reiterate the "if", I know nothing about Bhutan, and that little video was suspiciously happy-go-lucky) the majority of people are happy with traditionalism, why modernize? I ask that question, because, as a modern state, we are constantly finding that people aren't very happy - that things like depression are more frequent, etc. Of course, that's hard to tell, and possibly lost within "are more people depressed, or a more people being treated for depression?". But that's a whole other discussion that will have to wait until some other day.
The paper says fewer than 42% of first time voters think they will vote for a political party, yet 46% have already voted for contestants in shows like Big Brother and Pop Idol."
Source BBC News.
That is disgusting. But I think you could make an easy comparison to the US and Canada both.
I am meaning to write something about how our electoral system isn't working. It's not that voting doesn't work. It's just that our candidates all have somethings in common, with few exceptions: They are either businesspeople or they are lawyers. They are all living well above the median. There is something wrong with that picture. First off: I trust a businessperson less than I trust a lawyer, unquestionably. Second off: most of the time businesspeople and lawyers have about the least "hard life experience" in that they are rarely from impoverished backgrounds, single mothers, visible minorities, etc. Thirdly: most businesspeople and corporate lawyers (social lawyers are sometimes actually quite wonderful people) have vested interests. Bias doesn't disappear because it's not right on the surface. Friendships don't end just because So and So doesn't work directly for the company anymore... Businesspeople are trained to have one thing prioritized: the bottom line, at all costs.
I think that if we ever want real results in our government, we need to start electing educated people who have lived among the majority of people (ie. low income bracket). I think that we also need to stop electing businesspeople, especially. I think getting real results in elected government would stimulate the interest in actually participating in the electoral process. I think it would also begin to stimulate positive change within our society - we have to start deciding what's more important: the fullness of people's lives or the fullness of our "GNP".
Speaking of which, there was a interesting segment on CBC's national about Bhutan wanting to remain under an absolute monarchy rather than move towards a democracy. I won't make much discussion about this... I really don't know much about Bhutan at all, but the latter part of the video talks about the king promoting "GNH" (Gross National Happiness) rather than GNP (Gross National Product). Now, of course, issues are always more complex than that, and much more complex than shown within the video. But the idea of promoting the happiness of the people rather than the average wealth (which isn't a very good way of calculating how well people are faring within any given country. Here is a link to the video, if you're interested. It's only about four minutes long, and it's definitely worth discussion and attention. And of course, if (I reiterate the "if", I know nothing about Bhutan, and that little video was suspiciously happy-go-lucky) the majority of people are happy with traditionalism, why modernize? I ask that question, because, as a modern state, we are constantly finding that people aren't very happy - that things like depression are more frequent, etc. Of course, that's hard to tell, and possibly lost within "are more people depressed, or a more people being treated for depression?". But that's a whole other discussion that will have to wait until some other day.
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