just do it

[ramtops]

please, please - go and cast your vote today. If you don't, then you have no right to complain about what we get.

if you can't bring yourself to vote for any of 'em, then at least go and spoil your ballot paper.

exercise your right - people died to get it for you.

Comments

[ias.livejournal.com]

exercise your right - people died to get it for you.

I know, which is why I am extremely pissed off that I was removed from the electoral roll within 12 months of making a personal registration under the rolling registration programme. I, and the majority of the other Resident Tutors at the University of Bath, have been disenfranchised. All we can do is try and get the students out to vote instead.

[ramtops.livejournal.com]

that's disgraceful :( I presume you talked to your local council?

[ias.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, and Don Foster, but nothing could be done as we only discovered the problem after the deadline for resgistrations (as in mid-March the Uni were still promising us that they had made a proper and complete return).

[pickledginger.livejournal.com]

If you actually registered, but they failed to record it, I'd think the deadline wouldn't matter.

That's dreadful!

[robsoft.livejournal.com]

Mac, I would - I'd love to.

But I'm stuck on the wrong side of the country and won't get back until late tonight - too late to catch the polling station I think. I'll have to see what I can do. It's my own fault for being so damn disorganised - but you're right - people should exercise their right to vote.

If they put a box on the form that said "None of these candidates are suitable" then they could pretty much make voting mandatory, which I think would be a good thing. All this apathy and foregone-conclusion stuff would have to end, then.

[ramtops.livejournal.com]

I'm in two minds about mandatory voting; I think that - somehow - politicians should engage enough interest amongst the population to engage us all. But I suspect it's a vain hope :(

I slung together a quick site for some friends - www.spoilyourvote.co.uk (http://www.spoilyourvote.co.uk). I'm not going to spoil mine, but I think a lot of people will. And those numbers should be published.

oh - and be more organised next time! :)

[timill]

10 pm poll closing.

I will vote ...

[the-magician.livejournal.com]

... but not because people died to get it for you

Each time I hear sometyhing like that it sets my teeth on edge (which isn't pleasant!). People died for my right to not speak German, but that doesn't mean I must *never* learn German.

Voting is not just a right, but a responsibility. There are stupid people out there, there are easily influenced people out there, there are single issue fanatics out there and each of their votes is as important as yours or mine. There are people willing to elect someone because that person has said they would save the local hospital emergency department. The policy is good, but how will that "representative" work out for foreign aid, taxation, education, war in Iraq etc.? The single issue voter doesn't care, but will have to live with up to four years of that, and so will I.

If a person (even one of my friends or family) doesn't know the issues, hasn't investigated the candidates and still decides to vote, then, to my mind, their vote is diluting mine and everyone else's.

It's not a pleasant stand to take, and I don't want to take the vote away from anyone, I just think that it's an imperfect system (and while there are those that would say every other system is worse, I think required voting would be worse as it would lead to either random voting, or the candidate with the best ad campaign being more likely to win (oh wait, that's the American way!))

It's a very elitist stance to say that "if you don't know what you're voting for, don't vote", but we are electing "elite" people to do all the investigating of WMDs, deciding if the country goes to war, setting unemployment benefit levels etc. and we only get this one real chance twice a decade to influence that elite.

So yes, it is important that everyone goes and votes, but it is also important that everyone who votes knows what they are voting for and why they are voting that way, otherwise I'm worried about the government we get ...

... perhaps we should be allowed to vote off the Weakest MP every six months? Or "Tony Blair to the diary room"?