2016
Wow. Just wow.
It's been surreal. So much death, despair and other bad stuff beginning with the letter D and probably ending in Destruction.
The thing is... I knew in my heart of hearts that Leave would win. The reason I knew this (but clearly refused to acknowledge it as anything other than an irrational fear) was because, where I live, Northampton has always appeared to be a multi-cultural place with a lot of progressive thinking people and all I heard until June 23 was ignorance, racism and jingoism. I said recently that I'd met 1 person in 10 who was going to vote Remain, but the reality is it was closer to 1-30 and something was telling me to listen to this and that there was nothing I could do about it.
I'd been convinced Trump didn't stand a chance, but in the last few months that confidence was waning as it became clear that this man appealed to people who didn't vote, like Leave appealed to apathetic Brits. Clinton didn't have the ability to mobilise her supporters the way Trump organised his 'movement' and history was writ large by people, who experts believe are going to be the demographic least likely to benefit from this man's presidency.
Sounds all too familiar.
Yet, while I sit and gawp at my social media feeds full of horror, disbelief and insults, I can't feel that surprised by the US presidential election result. I just wish I'd had £100 on Trump this time last year.
While my social media is full of shock and awe I'm seeing one thing clearly - rational thinkers are in decline. What my social media has been devoid of has been anything remotely positive - a bit like Brexit but with added apocalypse warnings.
I'm sure that I'm not the only person who feels this way, but if I'm not we're all being deliberately quiet - a Third View is probably unwelcome in the polarised world of hate and reason, but almost from the point where I realised that Donald Trump had won I started to think: there's nothing we can do, so all we can do is resurrect hope.
I don't really feel all that hopeful, but what's the alternative? To sit and perpetuate disdain and negativity, much like I accuse the right wing of doing? Perhaps Brexit and Trump are the best things to happen to the Western World in decades; perhaps they'll shake up the neo-liberalism reality of haves and many have nots. I can't help thinking it is an unlikely scenario, yet oddly I think Trump will have a less traumatic effect on the Americans than Brexit will on the UK. I actually think little will change in the USA because Presidents don't really wield that much power when you think about it. Yes, they might be the most powerful people in the world but that's only figuratively; repeated presidents have failed to achieve their greatest ambitions because of the complicated structure of US government. In reality, Obama was a dead duck president from the moment he started talking about radical reforms and helping minorities, because the Republican-led House and Senate stymied his every move and so many deals had to be cut to get even the least radical ideas through.
Trump was elected as a Republican, but there's a lot of republicans out there who can't stand him; are either far left or right of whatever his actual politics are and then there's the Democrats, reduced to fighting over scraps but maybe in interesting bargaining positions. Trump will probably not heal the divides within the GOP, but if poor people don't see things happening and their senators and politicians are constantly opposing the man they voted for then the power of the people might manifest in curious ways. Personally, I think Trump is a mixture of canny and barking mad - all the best psychopaths are - I'm not convinced he'll be as right wing as people believe and I think he might represent a new breed of 'politician' - the Nationalist social democrat.
The idea of rampant Nationalism mixed with a slightly twisted version of socialism isn't that much of anathema, in many ways people don't link politics and racism in the same way. We've seen xenophobia and suspicion of foreigners in much greater numbers in urban places, in ageing ghettos and in the idyllic countryside. Incidents of racism in areas with more migrants tends to be higher, but you could say if you had a block of flats full to the brim with burglars will there be more burglaries? Many of these places would never consider voting Tory, yet wouldn't piss on a smouldering Bulgarian. Racism and politics are not exclusive and racism isn't just a right wing thing.
The sad thing about some of the comments I've seen over the last six months from Leave voters who would never call themselves racist are those who genuinely believe they aren't intolerant yet then say the country is full, or the foreigners are stretching our infrastructure to the limit, because it's easy to do that than look at the cause of why it is like that. I said in the last blog that humans simply don't like each other very much and that is reflected by the extra dislike we tend to show for people not like us. Amelioration obviously isn't working and humanity is a long way away from living peacefully and harmoniously together; if people can hate each other over something as simple as a leylandii then religion, avarice, and colour is a shoo-in.
What Trump and Brexit has done has shown, in possibly a slightly stupid, ill-educated way, that politicians have stopped being audible to almost 50% of the population of the world. People no longer vote because, to quote the most famous quote - it only encourages them. Or, it doesn't matter who you vote for the government gets in. People no longer see politicians working in their interests and this is compounded periodically by scandal, expenses, corruption or downright nastiness. Heck, even if you have the smallest of skeletons in your cupboard and talk only about fairness and peace you're just as likely, if not more, to be pilloried by the establishment and its lackeys.
What a world?
Me and many like me have had secret dreams of a world political takeover where fairness and equality replaces the current regime and there have been moments, albeit fleeting, where this seemed almost possible. It now seems that democracy is a bit broken in its current form and instead of the left exploiting it, the right have managed to reinvent themselves and steal it. It is a little like turkeys voting for Christmas and the millions who voted hoping for a significant change in their lives will, when they have finished blaming everyone else, will start looking at the people and politicians they were expecting to make a change - for the good - in their lives and demanding answers.
The problem is, unless the political system is examined, scrutinised and a fairer alternative put in place; one that makes people believe their vote is worth casting, less and less will actually vote and more and more 'mandates' will be based on ridiculously small percentages of the actual voting population. The reality of the UK is that only about 27% of the actual physical population voted for Brexit. In the USA the turnout was not much higher than 50% of which Trump actually got less votes than Clinton, so his potentially momentous term of office is a mandate from about 24% of all Americans. Politicians - at present - like low turnouts because they have a better chance of winning.
There's also one other thing that politicians need to do; they need to be more accessible rather than just plain slimy and creepy. They shouldn't have to be whiter than white but they should have the interests of the people at heart and be spared lobbyists, bribes and ways to corrupt the system for their own benefits. Politicians should only have one job and should, while they are in elected office, forsake any outside interests while allowing them to be open to scrutiny by an independent body to ensure they are working as MPs and not on securing the futures of just their families and friends. There should be fixed terms for MPs and the idea of becoming a career politician should be outlawed.
Extremism doesn't just exist on the right. I have formed some very extremist views in the last six months, one of which is unbelievably undemocratic and yet I'd argue for why I think it would be a good thing. I don't believe we should allow old people the vote and I do believe we should allow anyone over the age of 14 to be allowed to vote. The reason is simple and callous - old people don't particularly vote for what is the nation's interest; the key issues for very elderly voters is what's in it for them and there's a good chance many will die during a 5-year government. 14-17 year olds will spend as little as 20% but as much as 99% of their young lives being unable to have a say in a country that will have a say over them. If you turn 18 a week after an election, you'll be 23 by the time you get the chance to vote and you'll have no say in how those five years will affect you, politically. One vote might not mean much but a couple of million would.
I accept that we're not going to see a political Logan's Run scenario, but I would like to see the voting age dramatically reduced and more proactive education in schools about politics, how it affects everyone and what to expect if the world doesn't end up being lovely and fluffy with 6 bedroom mansions and a model wife/husband. Because at the moment we're creating a politically ignorant underclass of society that isn't emotionally mature enough to understand their significance.
No comments:
Post a Comment