h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

So we had the choice? Otherwise instead of being forced *not* to vote, we're just being forced in the other direction.

You haven't read the entry, have you?

B

What entry? The entry on this page just went to the election forum, which I didn't read. Unless I've missed something?

Just been back and read past what I thought was an official announcement to the entry.

I still think that trying to force people out to vote (or not vote) is wrong though.

Um. No. It goes to A3857448, if you click on it.

Ben

Whatever.

I am not trying to *force* people to vote as you imply that I am. I say that spoiling your paper or returning a blank paper is a more valid protest than not turning up at all.

*Have* you read the entry, Mina? It doesn't sound like it.

If you disagree with that I say - then disagree with what I say, not with what you think I might have said.

Ben

I did read it this time - sorry I missed it before - that first post was irrelevant to what you had written. I'm not sure what you're getting tart about though. I just disagree that people should be encouraged to get up and go and 'spoil' a paper (which I'm not even sure how to do anyway). If someone doesn't want to get up and go to the polling station or just can't be bothered then I think they should be left to it.

Just my opinion and I don't want to get into a row about it.

If you write anything at all on a paper other than one X in one box then it is spoiled.

You are still tilting at windmills. The argument states quite cogently that failing to turn up isn't a protest, it is laziness.

If someone cannot be bothered - then fine. If they choose to disenfranchise themselves then that is up to them. So long as they then accept that they have no moral right at all to complain about how the country is run, or to write to their MP stating their opinion or asking for help. They still have the legal right to those things of course, but no moral right to them.

Ben

And the reason I am tart is because, as you say, the first post was irrelevant to what I had written. It irritates me when people put words into my mouth, by implying I have said things I haven't said, and it *really* irritates me when they do it when they haven't actually read what I've said.

I guess I should learn to be more patient when it happens.

*breathe in*

*breathe out*

I'll add a definition of how to spoil a ballot paper to the entry though - it is an important omission, and one I hadn't realised was there.

Thanks.

Ben

I don't know what tilting at windmills means.

"The argument states quite cogently that failing to turn up isn't a protest, it is laziness."

I think I see the problem though - I'm not saying anything about protests, I'm just saying if people can't be arsed to vote, then trying to get them out of the house to not-vote wasn't going to do much good because as I said before, they can't be bothered in the first place. So in fact I am agreeing that it's laziness.

I did apologise for my misunderstanding at the beginning.

"Tilting at windmills" - to fight an illusionary enemy: http://www.bartleby.com/81/17515.html

Glad you agree it's laziness.

What this entry is trying to do is combat that laziness and get them out of the house to vote.

Since many of the people who don't turn up say it is because they don't want to vote for any of the parties on offer, it is giving them an alternative to doing so.

Falling turnouts will not improve the quality of our politicians, and bad politicians produce low turnouts.

If we want better politicians, then turning up and saying "you are all cr@p" explicitly by actually writing it on the ballot paper, makes more of a difference than not turning up at all.

Ben