Will we ever be passionate about politics?

[*Peaches* 10]

It's a form of protest that is still included in voter turnout. Less of a waste of time than not contributing at all, I think.

 

 

 

I postal vote anyway, most of the time I return it blank anyway

[Jessica23 10]

I postal vote anyway, most of the time I return it blank anyway

 

Much better than not returning it at all. Blank ballots count as spoiled

[*Peaches* 10]

Much less humerous than one I returned a while ago. I drew pictures on it

[StarSparkle 10]

Political threads on here get pretty passionate! It's politicians who make it boring!

 

StarSparkle

[esme 10]

"Will we ever be passionate about politics?"

 

by "we" I assume you mean the electorate in general rather than members of political parties or career politicians

 

well I would say we will become passionate about politics

 

only when what the electorate says affects government policy, and I don't mean once every five years or so when the politicians deign to allow us to wake up and exercise our democratic right to elect another politician and then go back to sleep for another five years or so while they go their own sweet way

 

only when you are allowed to discuss issues that affect you with an MP of your choice and who can do something about it, rather than the one who happens to be in charge of your constituency who may not agree with your views and won't do anything

 

only when you can vote politicians out of office as well as in, and I do mean at any time

 

only when government is actually answerable to the electorate for it's actions

 

so in short, never

[ToryCynic 10]

I grew-up to take an interest in the world around us and politics; I think I'm one of the few. I was told to form my own views, which is probably why I am the only Telegraph-reading-Tory-voter in the family.

 

I think many people are apathetic as they don't beleive it affects them, so they ignore it.

[esme 10]

I'm not apathetic and I know what the government does affects me personally, but nothing I do has an effect, the system is designed so that one voice is drowned out by the majority

 

still I shout as loudly as I can and every now and then I find a kindred spirit

 

maybe we should all get together and form our own party, the only trouble with that would be that the only manifesto pledges we'd have are

 

1 - reform the electoral system to make government answerable to the electorate

2 - once 1 is achieved, disband the party and call a general election

 

and the next government to be elected would promptly revoke all the changes made as they would make the process of government incredibly difficult and verging on the intolerable

 

so even if we get a government we can trust, then it will only be for a limited period and their replacements can rewrite the rulebook at will to prevent it ever happening again

 

basically the monkeys have the keys to the banana plantation and there's no way we can prise it back out of their grasp

[Rich 12]

As long as British Politics is run by a pack of clueless numpties, no one can get "passionate" about it, it's not even like most female Politicians are enough to get passionate over, at least Sarah Palin was good eye candy for the Yanks had McCain got in.

[esme 10]

thankfully the americans elected someone who thinks before he speaks

[espadrille 10]

We need someone here who thinks before he acts!!!

[El Robbo 10]

Firstly, it's worth noting that the turnout in the US election was estimated at 62%, which is the same as the UK election in 2005. The UK has been going down though - it was 85% in 1950.

 

My own opinion is that people feel disenfranchised from the political process because they don't feel they have any real impact - all three of the main parties have barely got enough space for a Rizla paper between their policies...they all represent business and aim their policies towards the floating voters, in particular what has become known as Middle England.

 

There's also a huge vacuum where the Labour party used to be - their membership has plummeted and that means no legions of foot soldiers knocking on doors, which is where they used to be strong - on the ground activism has disappeared apart from the small socialist parties. My own belief is that people on the left should be looking at this to try and fill the vacuum, but really just getting involved in asny form of politics, such as local campaigns around PO's or Academies or similar would help.

 

The electoral system also doesn't help - we're in dire need of Proportional Representation of some sort, which could open the way for more small parties to have their voice in Parliament, which in itself would get people's interest since - whether people agree or not - they would at least be going in and offering something different to what we currently have.

[jfish1936 10]

There's a lot of research on what people want. Not surprisingly, political parties look at these results, just as American television companies do: what will win the majority of the electors/viewers/whatever. Not surprisingly, the programs offered are very similar.

What percentage of the population really want nationalisation of the means of production, distribution and exchange? and would therefore vote for a Labour Party which restored this once-vital plank to its platform?

What percentage would vote for extreme Conservative "laissez-faire" and a totally unregulated market place?

If either answer is less than 40%, then forget the parties adopting it!

 

There's a terrifying bit of math here:

At an election, less than 10% of seats change;

In those seats, less than 10% of votes change;

so the election is decided by 10% of voters in 10% of seats, or 1% of the electorate!