Apathy rules OK?

I’m not voting. Why? I can’t be arsed.

I’ve made a conscious decision to be apathetic - a bit like keeping my hair unkempt on purpose. How yoof is that?

As I can’t be bothered to explain myself, I’ll let Alice Miles do the talking:

I find myself a bit jealous of the Scots and the French…. Differentiate between Labour and the SNP north of the Border? Easy. Scottish independence. Between Ségolène Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy? Of course: the Socialist and the rightwinger. And an 85 per cent turnout! We can only gasp in awe. Good for the French…

For the British, drifting into a potential two-year election campaign stuck in the ever-shrinking centre ground, our main parties dancing cautiously on pinheads, the sight of real politics is invigorating. It feels like you could breathe in Scotland and in France; debate serious issues, not whether a small percentage difference in a rise in GDP would “destroy the health service” or a twiddle to tax credits might shatter social progress.

As the main parties fight over the centre ground that I so comfortably straddle, and my vote effectively meaning less in my safe Labour constituency and ward, I’m happy in my complacency. Give me a choice, and I’ll give you a vote. In the meantime, I’ll check on the latest French and American opinion polls on elections that do matter. Or this addictively interactive site tracking the Scottish elections - it's ever so fancy. The Scots really care about this vote. I mean, 73 people have commented on the race for the Tweedale, Ettrick and Lauderdale constituency. But then it is a four-way marginal - it'd be rude not to be excited.

Some might say, I should turn up and abstain. But would I really be sending a chilling message to my political masters? One American response to apathy is a bill trying to include another “choice” on the ballot that says: “I choose not to vote”. Who does that? You might as well vote for the Lib Dems. Same difference.

Murad Ahmed

Comments

[Duncan]

Ah, but suppose that, if it got the majority, the "None of the above" option had the effect of disbarring the other cnadidiates in an immediate re-election, so requiring some different personalities and/or different policies. That would get people's attention wouldn't it?

[Ken Leyland]

You could argue that not voting means: "I'll accept whatever the majority decide" - in which case the winner's total should be increaed by the number of abstainers. That prospect might get them off their backside.

[Tom Fallowfield]

I agree with Duncan. Apathy must be distinguished from lack of confidence and distrust.

[Graeme Archer]

Or you could get off your cynical backside, join the Conservatives, and turn your "safe Labour ward" properly blue. If we can do it in Hackney it can be done anywhere. I'm sick of journalists moaning about the similarity between the two main parties. Let's leave aside I can't imagine David Cameron being arrested by the Met on serious fraud offences, or destroying our pension system, or lying to us about the reasons for war; there is not only a huge difference between Labour and Conservatives nationally (Labour have no conception of what Conservatives mean by Social Responsibility, let alone how to respond to it) there is a vast difference between the way the two parties run the boroughs they're in charge of. Both in terms of your journalistic remit - you are paid to write about and explore the philosophical and tactical differences between the parties - and in that which you reveal about your apathetic approach to civil democracy - this article is a disgrace.