For my Fresher readers, prepare to be alienated. Those of you who voted in last year’s Union elections – yes, all twelve of you – I understand that you thought voting ‘Felix for Felix Editor’ was funny. I get it, there was a funny man on the posters and everything. It’s hilarious, after all, when you do something silly in a serious situation. It’s like farting whilst giving evidence at The Hague, or wearing a spinning bow tie when you go to speak at your grandfather’s funeral. However, real democracy – yes, the kind that actually affects things – is subtly different to the Union elections, and so before I hear one more person tell me they’re going to vote for Boris ‘Gosh, Golly and Blige’ Johnson in the mayoral elections “for a laugh”, let me run through a few of the finer points.
First of all, unlike the Union elections, I can’t avoid the fallout if you get your way. That means that if you dick things up this time “for a laugh”, I can’t just stop eating in the JCR for twelve months and wait for them to bring back wholemeal rolls again. It’s an entire city, guys, and the only reason you know Boris’ name is because, in order of importance, he has silly hair, he was on an episode of Have I Got News For You, and he shagged someone he wasn’t supposed to. Now, whilst I accept that those three attributes cover 70% of Kensington and Chelsea’s inhabitants, that’s not exactly how choosing a political candidate is supposed to work.
And I know, I know, the papers call the other guy “Red Ken” and say bad things, and the papers are always right because the other day they told you to buy a man’s trenchcoat from Marks And Spencer and then that cute guy smiled at you in Starbucks. I get it. Thing is, though, they’re occasionally wrong about stuff, and even if you dislike Ken “Face Like A Cabbage That’s Been Through At Least One, If Not Two, Digestive Systems” Livingstone, it doesn’t really follow that you should vote in some nincompoop as some kind of spiteful backstab.
I have a friend who, on regular occasions, tells me that this country is great because of its proud history of Democracy. Not real Democracy, obviously, the fake kind where people ask your opinion and then spend four years subtly getting you to look the other way by pointing and shouting “Taxes!” but Democracy nonetheless. Needless to say, she hasn’t been in this country for an election, because if she had she’d realise just how much of a joke it’s become since we were lopping heads off of Kings and the like.
Presumably the desire to joke-vote your way into oblivion comes from the notion that your vote doesn’t actually count, as if the auditors at the Polling Booth look at each card and just say, “Well, he’s voted for Boris, but this guy’s a kidder. Put it in the incinerator, Geoff.” The idea that one voter is insignificant was fine when it made you stay at home and not give a toss – that was bliss, it meant that those of us that did vote could just tell you to where to shove it when you complained about the government six months later. Now you’ve decided to be post-modern and individual by voting for someone you find amusing, without realising that everyone else is going to do the same thing. Don’t get me wrong – people are just as cripplingly lazy in real elections as they were in the Union ones – but there’s nothing the general public likes more than doing pitifully ridiculous things en masse. See also: war, religion, buying throw rugs for sofas and Diet Coke.
Now, at this point you may be thinking, “But if everyone votes for Boris, that’s democracy, right? Whatever we wanted him for, at least we chose him.” And that’s fine, if you’re an idealist who thinks that Greece had it right all along. Unfortunately, we don’t live in a futuristic utopia where people take drugs to purify their minds and make clear-cut decisions about which colour to paint the living room. We live in a world where people take normal drugs, paint the living room disgusting variations on the same shade of beige, and vote for whoever they’re told to. So don’t try and tell me that the people get what they wish. The people get what they’re told to wish for. And on that note, I’d ask you – be careful what you wish for. You might get it.
