Information Landmine

"The Americans keep telling us how successful their system is. Then they remind us not to stray too far from our hotel at night." - An un-named EU trade representative quoted during international trade talks in Denver, Colorado, 1997.

Saturday, June 06, 2009

It is not the stupid who voted for this

The facebook status update of a friend of a friend of mine today reads "Congratulations to the people of Burnley for officially becoming the most ignorant in Britain." My sister talks of feeling sick at the news. Actually it's three seats now. Not that many? Well it's three seats more than they had before.
And so, the left wing idealists will begin their chatter about how the people are ignorant and how the strategies of Labour and Tory parties made the wins easy and they will be right. Yet they will be oh so wrong.

Our democracy is imperfect. Yet to the polls I went on Thursday without fear. I had a vote. I used my vote. There was nothing and nobody to stop me from voting. Perhaps most importantly, no one would even consider stopping me from voting. I know how lucky I am.

And with the results of our votes, the people of Britain speak. Because our democracy allows that. I can say what I like, and so can anyone. And so people chose to vote for the BNP. The BNP have a right to those seats. They won them fairly. We should be celebrating the freedom of democracy. For true freedom of speech is in embracing diversity and recognising the variety of opinion.

And maybe the current government have let us down. And maybe the only realistic alternative is led by a tosser that turns our stomach. And maybe there seems no hope for political leadership we actually like right now.

It is not the BNP voters who let down Britain. It is you who did not vote. It is you who let the BNP gain that bit more power. More than you think.

For protesting against the political gravy train through apathy is not protest. It is nothing. Because if you do not vote, those in power need not concern themselves with you.

What we perhaps should have learned from the MP expenses palava, is that if those in power want to gain from it (which is surely what popular opinion believes), then they will want to retain it. And so they need not concern themselves with the opinions of those who do not vote.

If the hearts and minds of the British people are moving right, then the politics of the mainstream will follow. AND THEN WHERE WILL WE BE?

And so I turn to those of you who do not vote. Those of you who see the injustice, the wrong, the hate and sit there and complain that none of your politicians meet your needs, and I see this country ruined because of you. Because our politicians do not set the political agenda, they merely follow it. It is us, each and everyone of us, who sets it.

And you, you have handed over responsibility for your life and your living and your community to these people through doing NOTHING. And then you complain when they don't represent it. BUT YOU TOLD THEM NOTHING. You sat back and gave them everything because you couldn't be bothered to do anything.

If the people of the UK vote over the next 10 or whatever years and the BNP gain more and more ground, then we have to understand it is what the people want. If it's not what you want, then it's time to start saying so now. Because maybe we can't all have exactly what we do want. Maybe we don't even know what it is that we want.
But if we agree that we don't want this, then now is the time to start moving against it.

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