Monday, June 19, 2006

Shame!

Warning: This is not KDE nor FLOSS related, you can freely skip it if you don't want to read a real life rant.

Yesterday, in Catalonia there was a referendum to vote about a new statute of autonomy.

And more than 50% of voters did not vote, i feel shame for that. Not voting means you are out of game, you can vote yes, vote no, do a blank vote, put KDE logo on the voting envelope, or even put a photo of yourslef on it, but VOTE!

If you don't vote, you just demonstrate that you are nothing more than a drone, going to work, having some vacation, seeing world cup on TV and repeat, you can not express a "i'm dissapointed with politics" with abstention, you just demonstrate dullness of mind.

11 comments:

Kleag said...

I did not hear of this percentage! You're right, Albert, not voting, is voting loss of liberty.

Anonymous said...

I think sometimes its better laying at home than voting whatever you hear that's better whithout knowing what you are doing...
Afterall it is the individue who decides not to exercise his rights, and not anyone other.

Anonymous said...

I agrea with you totaly to vote is to participate and now a day's people dont vote mainly out of laisiness and lack of interest on the subjects.
Then they say to back them up that all politicians are the same, NO THEY ARE NOT!
It is this kinda of indulgence by the people that leavs room to all the realy nasty populist politicians!
Please VOTE!!!

Anonymous said...

Why is better to put a KDE logo than no voting? To make political parties feel better? I do hate all of them, I won't give them that pleasure and excuse the whole shit they do.

Really, it's difficult for me to see people voting, but even more difficult to understand why people would ask others to vote.

Albert Astals Cid said...

@anonymous

Obviously you don't get it, not going to vote does not affect politics in any way, after all, all they get is final figures, and that's 74% yes, 21%no, 5% blank and 1% null, you can only express your disagreement with either blank or null.

There's a slight difference between them, but until you can not see the difference between voting and no voting there's no need to explain the difference between blank and null.

Anonymous said...

Obviously you don't get it, going to vote does not affect politics in any way. You can express your disagreement in many ways, the less important being voting.

Why do you think I see no difference between voting and no voting? Of course it's different. What I'm saying is that voting is no better.

There are four ways to express disagreement: vote no, vote blank, vote null and no vote. Why the first three are better? To legitimate the result and make spanish right-wing shut up? They will not whatever the result. European Constitution did have even more abstention and was legitimated by both spanish bigger political parties.

IMHO, if people have not voted is due to tiredness of this circus. So much propaganda for so small advance.

Anyway, you are asking people to vote, you should provide arguments to do so, apart from 'otherwise you show dullness of mind'.

Anonymous said...

This argument -- that people who don't vote are indifferent, or ignorant, or somehow wasting their voice -- is given much too often, without really thinking it through. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it's propaganda, which is harmful to real progress, to keep passing around. Of course, it's yor right to say whatever you choose, but please choose wisely, after educating yourself a little more. Reading Thoreau's Civil Disobedience might be a good start.

Anonymous said...

You might do well to ask yourself this: if the choice was between Mussolini and Hitler, would you STILL vote? Sometimes the only option for a person with integrity is to stand well back, in order to dissociate themselves from the madness.

Albert Astals Cid said...

@anonymous

Of course, i've vote null.

Anonymous said...

Part of the right of voting is choosing not to vote. I don't vote on issues that I don't consider myself to be sufficiently educated on. I tend to vote on 30 to 70 percent of issues and candidates during any given election.

I would consider it more intelligent to know when not to vote than to blindly vote.

Anonymous said...

If the percentage was anywhere near 50%, it would be a record. In fact, that may be a record. Most people here don't vote.

That I said, I do. Every election. I missed one, from being in the hospital, all my life. I do, however, usually vote 3rd party to show my dissent with the current topics. ( so I would vote null in this case )

-Quaru