Venn diagrams for our times: why people don’t vote

Posted on December 31 2013

Screen shot 2013-12-31 at 10.38.45

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11 Responses

  1. Benjohn says:
    December 31 2013 at 11:46 am

    You might add a third category to show promises broken.

    There’s little point in voting for a party that breaks its promises. Breaking promises, or extending wildly beyond a granted mandate, makes a mockery of representational-democracy’s justification.

  2. Bill Kruse says:
    December 31 2013 at 1:28 pm

    It’s absurd voting for any system of government which tolerates the presence of someone like Duncan-Smith. I shan’t be voting, never have.

    • Richard Murphy says:
      December 31 2013 at 1:54 pm

      I think that’s a serious mistake

      Vote Green if you want to protest

      • Bill Kruse says:
        December 31 2013 at 2:08 pm

        I’m tempted, I was when Thatcher was in too, but really it’s the whole system that stinks. I’d prefer the Greens to anyone else but electing them doesn’t do what’s needed and that’s to change away from this form of society. I’ve been looking into the Druids, as I said I would, in the search for alternatives. The whole tree-hugging white sheet thing is a relatively recent invention, I’m given to understand, picked up and embellished over the last few decades. We had kings before and so through them there was at least the appearance of central authority but they were well-known for acting on instruction from the druids, such was their respect, which made them the real authority. Druid was a blanket term for the then equivalent of the professional classes, individual druids were drawn from many professions and had many functions, some as I say working as advisors. This seems to have been a situation which simply evolved. The societal structure we have through the Western world now is an imposition one, essentially still Roman in character, and substituting one bunch of faux Romans for another bunch doesn’t address that funamental problem. It’s the existing order of things that needs to go, not those who staff it.

      • Simon says:
        December 31 2013 at 4:48 pm

        The greens don’t field candidates in many areas and the present system forces many to vote tactically which is essentially a negative stance. Without PR we will continue to have largely unelected mafiosi and thugs. In my constituency I will be obliged to vote lib Dem as the only chance of keeping the highly wealthy rentier Tory out. The system is rotten to the core and creates modern rotten boroughs. Like America, we have a one party system -neo-liberal-neo-liberal or neo-liberal. I will vote but the sense of futility is very de-motivating to say the least.

  3. William1 says:
    January 1 2014 at 2:54 am

    I don’t agree with the belief that people don’t vote because of apathy. I remember about 5 years ago the BNP almost won a seat in Lancashire. The seat (Preston, Burnley, Oldham not sure?) ended up being (just) held by Labour with a huge turn-out, almost like 70% at a time when most Northern seats were satisfied with less than 40%.
    Whatever you think of the BNP’s vile spawn they motivated people to get out of their armchairs!
    Another good example is George Galloway. Wherever he stands has the highest turn-out & he usually wins!
    People can be motivated if they think they’re voting for (or, more importantly, against) something outside the old, dull, 2 party hegemony.

  4. JohnM says:
    January 2 2014 at 6:27 pm

    ¨People want an effective, involved, representative politics¨

    I suspect that the last thing the political pygmies we have representing us want, is an effective involved electorate.
    A bored, worried and depressed electorate would be preferable for them….oh, wait…