A series of quotes relevant to the environment and/or campaigning.
This week’s quote is from US politician Keith Ellison (born 1963).
Not voting is not a protest. It is a surrender.
https://citatis.com/a11099/
More on Keith Ellison (click here).
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Indeed people died to get the ordinary man and all women the vote, not voting is a betrayal of their legacy. Yet far too many of us “cannot be bothered.” I used to work with some of such folk, they claimed it changed nothing. However your vote might not change anything but one thing is certain if you don’t vote you change nothing at all.
I would like to honour the legacy of all those people who died but feel very reluctant to vote for people who are intent on dishonouring them. I really would like to vote but I have a dilemma. I can’t vote for a bunch of robbers, a bunch of anti-semitic robbers, a bunch of whining loony robbers or a bunch of water-melon robbers, because voting for people for whom you have no respect would be crazy and it would be crazy if important decisions like who should shaft the Country least badly for a while were made by crazy people. So I am left with the choice of not voting or voting for King Arthur Pendragon, who has a viewpoint quite close to my own. Apart from the Druidism.
Even if I vote for King Arthur I have a very strong feeling based on past election results that he will not win – so my vote would knowingly be wasted. A futile gesture. With the same outcome as a spoiled paper or not voting at all. But should I vote I will have to go to the Village Hall or wherever it is this time and as it’s too far to walk I would have to burn fossil fuel in my Jamjar in order to cast a vote I know to be pointless.
So there’s the nub of the dilemma – vote for a independent, decent but eccentric chap I know won’t win, or Save the Planet.
Filbert there is a big difference between your dilemma and not being bothered. You are clearly bothered and will be making a conscious decision based on that.
I too have a dilemma, I live in a place where for me the worst option is likely to win, the Blue robbers, but the ones most likely to keep them out, the yellows who have a more attractive main policy in this but I really don’t like all their other baggage/ recent history and have no trust in their Blue-lite leader.
What I can say is I will vote, even though I too will have to drive to the polling station.
Just do what you feel you must.