Leila's blog

Wed, Apr 30, 2008

Don't forget to vote

I have a lot of friends who won't be voting tomorrow out of principle. They are of the opinion that anarchic self rule is the only option for governance or that the current system is so corrupt / pointless that voting only acts to legitimise a system that is inherently flawed. However, as it is the system we live under and as no revolution is seriously brewing, voting for people who agree that it needs changing is a protest against that system and a mechanism for achieving change. Not voting doesn't make any sense to me; spoiling a ballot paper is a legitimate form of protest but a change to a more democratic system relies on removing power from those who wield it badly. By not voting those in power are able to say that people are happy with the status quo because the opposite isn't being clearly demonstrated; by not voting the UK's two party 'dictatorship' is upheld. Yet the very people who refuse to vote are the most likely to be active and concerned about human rights abuses in more obvious real dictatorships. We have a limited choice as to who makes the important decisions - to go to war or not, what to spend income tax on, to abide by or challenge international bodies, how to organise recycling collections - but it is a choice nonetheless. The elected body may be in charge of decisions momentous or mundane, but they are decisions made on the behalf of their electorate. A simple analogy is going to a restaurant and letting the strangers at the next table choose what you'll be eating. You wouldn't let that happen. So, please make that effort to go to the voting box as it is your hard won right to choose who is in charge.

For those of you who do vote, no matter who for, thank you.

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