According to the official data, the law that enables politics to actively and directly influence the national public television is going to be enforced. Great. Hurray for tooth decay and all that.
The problem I am having is attendance. 30% for a referendum is not exactly the figure I am looking for. In fact, it`s way low. Waaaayy low. This figure means that a person in Slovenia is responsible for the three other people. One person makes up its mind and three people have to respect that. Which is stupid and irresponsible.
The Slovene do not like to vote. In general, only the referendums for the independence and the EU/NATO are the true referendums, with attendance shooting up to 60, 70 and 90% of the voting populations. Others are squirming in the back, with attendance being 20, 30 and 35%.
Why exactly is that? Baya is debating the e-democracy, but that is “just” a tool. Which is only step two. Step one however is a quality leap that every person has to do for itself. We have to be aware that what we are doing, changes the future. That we are responsible. And that saying that nothing will ever change is irresponsible and dumb. Really dumb. I think coyote votes. And he is not the brightest peeble on the beach.
I know people have better things to do, but come on! this is not exactly the operation of a heart. It lasts for less than ten minutes for you to get your ass down there and cast vote. And yet, people refuse to do so. They stay away from the voting booths, doing god knows what.
I vote. Every single time. Because I believe that only with active participation, the democracy can work. Staying home does not help one bit.
And now, I`ll go powder my nose and be on my way. See you on the (hopefully) sunny sea-side!
I was recently complaining about this (lack of voter participation) when a friend replied: “Well, are you sure you want people who don’t care enough or know enough to vote to determine the future of the country?” It’s a valid point, I think. But you’re very right that people who don’t think their vote matters are silly. (The closeness of this referendum proves that.)
Nevertheless: enjoy your time at the coast!
I’m wondering if this lack of voter participation is not partly due to the growth of consumer mentality. Rather than trying to do things, or to think about things, or to have meaningful and authentic experiences, we try to achieve them by the quick and easy shortcut of paying for somebody or something. We are used to hiring people do to more and more things for us, rather than doing anything by ourselves. We hire plumbers and car mechanics rather than doing it ourselves, we buy flowers and vegetables and cakes rather than growing and baking our own, etc., etc. Thus, we also have a mental image that we have “hired” (e.g. through paying taxes) the politicians to perform all the political tasks, like debating and voting and so on, and we don’t feel that it is necessary for us to take an active interest in this any more. That is, perhaps the prevailing mentality is: “this is the politicians’ business, they should’t be bothering us with this, and besides, they are all dirty corrupt thieving idiots anyway, so none of them deserve our votes”. Another reason may be that people are unhappy with the boring way democratic politics works: slow and gradual changes, and nothing ever seems to happen. Sure, if by casting a vote one could cause one’s income to be tripled and one’s work week to be shortened by half, one would gladly do it. Or if one could finally get to see those-who-do-not-agree-with-one placed in front of the nearest wall and shot. Etc. But given the tiny measly insignificant choices that we voters actually have nowadays, it is hardly suprising that many don’t bother to participate.
I agree that democracy can only work with active participation. But maybe the lack of active participation indicates a kind of disenchantment with democracy, and with the increasing inability of the present political-economic system to take good care of the people. As the well-known dictum goes, democracy is a bad system, but all the others are even worse. However, the less experience we have with other systems, the more we focus on the fact that democracy is bad.