Solicitors

[Deleted]

The moment I came off the train this wmorning on my way to work, I was ambushed by some women with info sheets on the Conservative party. Why can't they just leave me alone? I'm not even going to vote!

[grahamthomson]

Mat, it's your duty to vote as a citizen of democracy! If not, the future will turn into all those comic books we've been reading.

[skillex]

It really is everyone's responsibility to vote.

I could go on about the many people who have fought and died to get us this basic right. I could go on about how priveleged we are to have the vote compared with the millions of other people on this planet who are denied that right, many of whom are campaigning for this right and are being imprisoned, tortured, killed etc for this. I could do on about how politics, and therefore voting, influences absolutely every part of your life - from the TV you watch to the job you can have to the clothes, DVDs, books etc you buy to the food you eat to traffic jams to pub closing times etc ...

But I won't (OK so I just did) but I will echo exactly what Graham has just said.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zruGBWLk9s8

[Dave]

Yes you should vote. And yes people sticking leaflets in your face is annoying.

Last time was bad as I was expecting something that day and kept getting up to answer the door only to be greeted with "Hii!!! have you been to vote yet!"

[Deleted]

Apr 7, 2010 9:01:50 GMT @grahamthomson said:

Mat, it's your duty to vote as a citizen of democracy! If not, the future will turn into all those comic books we've been reading.

Superheroes will come and help us? lol

I would vote if I was motivated to do it, but all the parties seem a bit self serving and indifferential to me, so it doesn't make a difference to me in the slightest

[grahamthomson]

Would acting out policies with sock puppets make a difference?

[Deleted]

Apr 7, 2010 12:27:59 GMT @grahamthomson said:

Would acting out policies with sock puppets make a difference?

What types of Sock Puppets?

[The Doctor]

Several years ago I switched to postal voting to avoid being harangued on the way to voting booths.


-Ralph

[Fortmax2020]

This year I must postal vote as well as I shall be away the week of the Election.

I wonder if the new government will let me back in when I return?

[Grand Moff Muffin]

I think the people of the UK should be ashamed that countries where people risk being killed if they turn out vote, and where there are far more reasons to be cynical about democracy, have higher turnouts than we do. We don't call them idiots for turning out, we call them brave for exercising their rights. But if and when those democracies become stable, their media free, and the biggest corruption scandals involve expense claims and lobbying, will all those brave voters turn to western style apathy and "not be able to be bothered" any more?

Vote.

Martin

[Bogatan]

I always vote and its always a waste of time. Labour own this patch. And Labour have given me the creeps since Blair became leader. And no thats not the best reason to not vote for a party, but by 2006 it seemed an awful lot more people felt that way.

Andy

[Grand Moff Muffin]

Apr 7, 2010 17:48:40 GMT Bogatan said:

I always vote and its always a waste of time. Labour own this patch.

But the safe seats are often only safe because of all the people who don't bother vote because it's a safe seat.

If you don't vote because you think your vote can't change the result in your area, you are one of the people who contributes to that being true.

Martin

[legios]

Apr 7, 2010 18:03:28 GMT Grand Moff Muffin said:

But the safe seats are often only safe because of all the people who don't bother vote because it's a safe seat.

If you don't vote because you think your vote can't change the result in your area, you are one of the people who contributes to that being true.

Martin

I'd have to agree with that. The place I live is considered a fairly safe Labour seat (at the last election their margin of victory was something like the total vote of two of the other parties combined), so from one perspective you could say that my vote doesn't matter. On the other hand, if I didn't vote then their margin of victory would have been one higher so from that perspective I would argue that my vote did make a difference.

Besides, I figure that political engagement is a necessary part of a representative system. If I don't exercise my right to take part in the process then I abrogate my right to criticise it.

(Although the most blackly amusing thing I have seen was the last Scottish Parlimentary elections, where a number of people I worked with decided to vote for the SNP on the basis of protesting the invasion of Iraq - specifically as a protest vote and as they very much did not want an SNP administration in the Parly - and then were very surprised that the SNP garned enough votes to form an administration..... It did not apparently occur to them until after the event that if you don't want someone to form a government then you probably need to.... I don't know, vote for someone else?)

[Fortmax2020]

My region is a Labour one at present but there are only a few hundred votes in it and the current MP is standing down so it should prove quite interesting to see what happens here.