Elections

The morning light penetrates the curtains and a deep sigh heaves past your lips as you clamour out of bed. Vegemite on toast is no consolation, nor is the warm breeze and singing birdlife that greets you at your doorstep. Reluctance renders your thighs incapable of movement, before a forced step sets you on your way towards the local primary school. You regret that last hesitation at the front gate, as energetic pamphleteers drown you with the same stupid grin as the glossy posters of their respective masters. Not far to go now; Election Day is almost over.

With such joy do we celebrate our occasional democratic duty; savouring those few weeks in which everyone voices their two bob’s worth. While the blood of the passionate boils and the tongues of the ignorant wag, it is tough for the average voter not slump into lukewarm indifference as the standard of our discourse plummets. Amplified by the noise of anonymous user comments on news items and social media stand-offs, one cannot be blamed for being sick of it all.

When Simon de Montfort defeated King Henry III’s army and instituted the first elected English parliament in 1265, he became a poster boy for democracy and remains so today. Sadly, for de Montfort, progress was going a little too fast for the aristocracy and the church. Within a year his allies changed teams, the King was restored and his dismembered corpse was displayed on various pikestaffs around England. Although quartering has gone out of fashion – our current political crop bears the same ill-mannered fruit.

Some men were born to lead.

By the early 1700s, the two-party, legislative system evolved in Great Britain. Over the next hundred years, a brood of distantly related, fat, German kings sat upon the throne; power gradually shifting from the monarch to the parliament. The Australian colonies soon adopted this system, before creating the Commonwealth Parliament in 1901. Since the emergence of the Liberals in 1946, two familiar shades of grey preside to this day. The other being Labor which was founded in 1891. 

The contrasting agendas of the conservative, royalist Tories and the progressive, reforming Whigs of 18^th Century British parliament have, in Australia, evolved into little more than a managerial bickering between two indistinguishable groups of technocrats. By technocrats, I mean the caste of managerial politicians who revel in the endless one-upmanship, knowing that saying nothing is much more effective than saying something imaginative or controversial. Both sides feed off each other’s mistakes – turning a statement made in jest or an admission of fault by either side into childlike gossiping while we – the hungry pigs – snuffle at the media trough, greedily devouring mud disguised as apples.

When you stand there at the entrance of the primary school, take the time to observe the compartmentalising of our common sense and intelligence into bland slogans and bleached smiles. Compare it to the nothingness that wafts from the talking heads that are experts in not answering questions and playing it safe. Know that a politician, by any other name, will still smell as repugnant. Ponder the days where they once contemplated the people who gave them their position and take comfort that plenty more are in line to take their place.

Election Day is our day to speak. Don’t worry too much – you are already spoken for.