Alan Moore's planning to vote for the first time in over 40 years.

November 21, 2019 2:26 AM

Moore explained the reasons for his decision via this tweet from his daughter Amber. "I've voted only once in my life, more than forty years ago, being convinced that leaders are mostly of benefit to no one save themselves," he writes. "That said, some leaders are so unbelievably malevolent and catastrophic that they must be strenuously opposed by any means available. Put simply, I do not believe that four more years of these rapacious, smirking right-wing parasites will leave us with a culture, a society or an environment in which we have the luxury of even imagining alternatives."

Later in his announcement, Moore adds: "If my work has meant anything to you over the years, if the way that modern life is going makes you fear for all the things you value, then please get out there on polling day and make your voice heard with a vote against this heartless trampling of everybody's safety, dignity and dreams."

posted by Paul Slade (78 comments total)

voting is good.

using forbidden snake-god chaos magick against boris johnson is also good.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 2:29 AM on November 21, 2019 [76 favorites]

Why stop at Boris? Leave some for the rest of the Tories and Lib Dems, they earned it.
posted by Bangaioh at 3:40 AM on November 21, 2019 [3 favorites]

And he's just twigging to what these shitgibbons stand for NOW?!? smdh vigorously
posted by ivanthenotsoterrible at 3:50 AM on November 21, 2019 [26 favorites]

Why stop at the Tories and Lib Dems? Surely we can smite Labour too.
posted by diziet at 3:52 AM on November 21, 2019

>being convinced that leaders are mostly of benefit to no one save themselves,

Is this supposed to sound clever? The question is whether they're of HARM to anybody, and whether you maybe ought to take an interest if so. One of the reasons we've got the kind of shitweasels we've got now in the halls of power is because people can't be bothered to vote. I mean, whatever, better late than never, but he's a literary feller and ought to know what it is that an ounce of prevention is worth.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 4:13 AM on November 21, 2019 [47 favorites]

But is his BEARD going to finally vote-- that's the question.
posted by KingEdRa at 4:18 AM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

But is his BEARD going to finally vote-- that's the question.

His beard has been voting for years. It just finally talked him into doing so as well.
posted by jzb at 4:27 AM on November 21, 2019 [11 favorites]

Wrong: I don't vote because leaders are mostly of benefit to themselves.

Better: Some leaders are so bad they must be opposed by any means possible, so I will now vote.

Right: I thought that I was making a principled stand by refusing to vote, but I now understand that I was only neglecting my duty as a citizen to take the most minimal act in guiding my government's direction, regardless of how I personally feel about the individuals acting as my representatives. In refusing to participate in electoral democracy, I realize now that I am, in at least a small way, responsible for the state my government is now in. If I ever encouraged others to also refuse to vote, either by rhetoric or by example, I amplified this harm tremendously. I was wrong and I'm sorry. Everyone in a representative democracy has a voice, no matter how small, and a responsibility to use that voice in an informed, considered way to choose the path forward that best represents their values and beliefs. Voting is the beginning, not the end, of democratic participation.
posted by biogeo at 4:31 AM on November 21, 2019 [169 favorites]

I mean, he even goes on to say, "The wretched world we're living in at present was not an unlucky turn of fate; it was an economic and political decision, made without consulting the enormous human population that it would most drastically affect." Sorry, 'made without consulting'? The way they're supposed to consult you is by registering your vote; if you didn't cast one, it's silly to complain that nobody asked you.

Again, welcome to the party; I think there's still a can or two of Dr. Pepper in one of the coolers--help yourself. But next time show up earlier. (And on preview, what biogeo said.)
posted by Sing Or Swim at 4:40 AM on November 21, 2019 [50 favorites]

smdh vigorously

That was my response. What, have you been in a fucking laudanum fugue this whole time, you pasty warlock? Luckily Alan Moore's non-vote probably didn't count for much, until he decided to reveal the astonishing degree of isolation between his fictional politics and reality.

Gah. Has Neil Gaiman voiced a number of opinions since his SO stuck her foot in it? Do we care while the world burns?
posted by aspersioncast at 4:56 AM on November 21, 2019 [32 favorites]

@HedgeWizards4Corbyn
posted by acb at 5:01 AM on November 21, 2019 [6 favorites]

If he doesn't/didn't vote he has no right to make any political comments whatsoever!
posted by Burn_IT at 5:08 AM on November 21, 2019

Metafilter: have you been in a fucking laudanum fugue this whole time, you pasty warlock?
posted by lalochezia at 5:22 AM on November 21, 2019 [81 favorites]

Is this supposed to sound clever?

The people who promulgate this kind of sophomoric aphorism usually seem very pleased with themselves
posted by thelonius at 5:24 AM on November 21, 2019 [12 favorites]

Don't blame me, I didn't vote.
posted by 2N2222 at 5:26 AM on November 21, 2019 [4 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.
posted by Space Coyote at 5:35 AM on November 21, 2019 [13 favorites]

I agree it would have been better if Moore had recognised the value of voting long ago. My hope in starting this thread, however, was that his words might prompt any MeFites sharing his old stance to reconsider. This applies just as much to the coming US Presidential election as it does to our own General Election here in the UK, of course.
posted by Paul Slade at 5:39 AM on November 21, 2019 [16 favorites]

I think what people are missing here is that Moore is a prominent anarchist with a substantial fanbase, a group that traditionally wouldn't vote. I have my own anarchist leanings so I am sympathetic to those arguments, but I nonetheless have voted whenever I have the opportunity.

If he can persuade some of those people to vote that could make a difference. It doesn't mean you endorse the current system to do so.

And yes, the irony that anarchists often fail to think for themselves and unquestioningly follow the orders of their own authority figures is not lost on me.
posted by Acey at 5:39 AM on November 21, 2019 [47 favorites]

Yeah I'm like, you're in a canoe with a hole in it and you won't use a bucket to bail just because the bucket also has a hole in it or something? Fuck outta here.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:40 AM on November 21, 2019 [28 favorites]

I'm sympathetic to the, "Maybe we just shouldn't have leaders!" sentiment. But, like, all of the evidence history indicates that we're gonna. It does seem to be rather hardwired into our brainmeat. Soooo, you gonna help not make this awful or nah?
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:49 AM on November 21, 2019 [10 favorites]

An unexpected part of growing up has been getting disappointed when you find out that many of the figures who inspired that fun snotty teenage misanthropy in you back in the day could connect to kids on certain issues so well because they didn't actually have fully formed adult takes on those issues themselves.
posted by jason_steakums at 5:50 AM on November 21, 2019 [56 favorites]

There is not always a candidate you want to vote for. However, there is almost always a candidate you want to vote against.
posted by fings at 5:51 AM on November 21, 2019 [16 favorites]

Not sure where in Northampton he lives but both seats have been swing seats in a number of general elections since 1979 and both were marginals in 2017.
posted by biffa at 5:51 AM on November 21, 2019 [4 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

Only time I've ever seen Corbyn speak was 15th February 2003, and he seemed pretty anti-invasion, just like the other 500,000+ people in Hyde Park that day.

But given that I've only just got round to realising that the Lib Dems, as they currently are, are shitty proponents of "austerity", despite having been against the invasion of Iraq, I'm going to drink from the punchbowl with the least shit in it. And I'll feel shit if the Tories beat the incumbent Lib Dem here, but at least I'll have voted for the person who believes in a modern social democratic government.

Also, I think a lot of the people "self-righteously" commenting here had the Republican party send their armed forces to invade Iraq.
posted by ambrosen at 5:58 AM on November 21, 2019 [9 favorites]

Yes Corbyn's Labour is worth voting for for someone with Moore's convictions in a way that New Labour was not. Moore is not foolish for this belief.
posted by Space Coyote at 6:01 AM on November 21, 2019 [19 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

I remember which party.
It shared a name with the party that just pledged to enact every recommendation of the chilcot enquiry and pass a law forcing a Prime Minister to seek parliamentary approval before committing to military action.
Ideally it wouldn't share much else with them.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 6:01 AM on November 21, 2019 [3 favorites]

shaking my head at these fair weather voters who only show up when someone with "good politics" and "a moral vision for the future" is running, when the real heads are out here, every four years, waking up early and voting for whatever dead eyed corporate stooge, spewing anodyne focused grouped nothings while they gut society for the benefit of the already wealthy, is put in front of us.
posted by Reyturner at 6:06 AM on November 21, 2019 [20 favorites]

the real heads are out here, every four years

In Alan Moore's country, we only get elections every <stifles a giggle> 5 years. But at least we get a decent number of parties to vote for.
posted by ambrosen at 6:20 AM on November 21, 2019 [3 favorites]

Metafilter: Lots of self-righteous people in this thread

I thought that I was making a principled stand by refusing to vote, but I now understand that I was only neglecting my duty as a citizen to take the most minimal act in guiding my government's direction

Hot take: Moore's principled refusal to vote is no different (or at most cosmetically different) to a voter in a marginal seat refusing to engage in tactical voting on the grounds that 'I could never vote for X' / 'I'm a loyal Y voter'.
posted by inire at 6:23 AM on November 21, 2019 [12 favorites]

In refusing to participate in electoral democracy, I realize now that I am, in at least a small way, responsible for the state my government is now in.

I knew that 40-50% of UK millennials and Gen Z were up to no good!
posted by inire at 6:33 AM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

Not sure where in Northampton he lives but both seats have been swing seats in a number of general elections since 1979 and both were marginals in 2017.

Here's the 2017 figures:
Northampton North
Northampton South
posted by Paul Slade at 6:36 AM on November 21, 2019

Alan Moore: I think the impact of superheroes on popular culture is both tremendously embarrassing and not a little worrying.
Twitter: See, now this is what a clear-headed grown ass adult says and--
Alan Moore: I also haven't voted in 40 years because I didn't see a point and
posted by DirtyOldTown at 6:36 AM on November 21, 2019 [22 favorites]

> Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

Yes, well, that was definitely bad, but the real question is not who did a thing back when under their name, but who's in now and what they stand to do when they are able to.

It's a conversation we have to have frequently here in the U.S. when a Republican asserts that they can't be racist because they're in the Party of Lincoln.
posted by at by at 6:37 AM on November 21, 2019 [12 favorites]

I'm old. Most of the time growing up people I knew couldn't see much point in one party or the other. Not that I agreed with them (most of the time). When it's *easy* to see, then times are bad. :(
posted by aleph at 6:41 AM on November 21, 2019 [3 favorites]

Say what you will about the politics of the South Park guys, but the message of the "Douche and Turd" episode is that you have a duty to vote even if the choices are bad.
posted by riruro at 6:46 AM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

This is not the Mötley Crüe that made the album Mötley Crüe.
posted by Cardinal Fang at 6:47 AM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

Hope he remembered to register in good time.
posted by Segundus at 6:50 AM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

I'm glad that Moore is voting, but strangely enough, as I get older, I feel less inclined to judge people who don't vote. Understand: I would never not vote. That is insane, to me. But! When I voted for Hillary Clinton, I knew the following:

*She would, probably, do nothing to course correct American involvement in conflicts overseas; Obama hadn't, in eight years!, and Clinton seemed more hawkish, indeed more hawkish than nearly any other democrat.

*She would, probably, do nothing about student loans. She literally had laughed at the suggestion.

*She would, probably, do nothing to make health care better. Her feeling was that Obamacare was pretty good. It wasn't. It was a pitiful half baby-step in the right direction. Would this deeply compromised, utterly estranged from the everyday lives of most Americans career politician even consider Medicare for all? Come on, dude.

I still voted for her, but I cannot honestly find it in my heart to blame anyone who stayed home rather than vote for her. I just can't. Trump is a disaster, but "not a disaster" is not enough. When it comes to survival, okay. But you just have to do better, and if you can't do better, it can't be somebody else's fault not enough people voted for you.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:52 AM on November 21, 2019 [19 favorites]

Trump is a disaster, but "not a disaster" is not enougH.

Actually, when it’s your womb, your climate, or your deportation paperwork, it definitely is.
posted by Miko at 6:54 AM on November 21, 2019 [75 favorites]

“Not a disaster” is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick any day.
posted by acb at 6:56 AM on November 21, 2019 [15 favorites]

Apparently not for everyone. I don't know why left-leaning voters insist on candidates they believe in, but here we are, I guess.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:56 AM on November 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

your womb, your climate, or your deportation paperwork

tbh even other people's wombs, climate and deportation paperwork should be sufficient
posted by inire at 6:56 AM on November 21, 2019 [48 favorites]

when the real heads are out here, every four years, waking up early and voting for whatever dead eyed corporate stooge, spewing anodyne focused grouped nothings while they gut society for the benefit of the already wealthy, is put in front of us

“The real heads” are not just voting every four years. They’re not just voting every two years in midterms and presidential elections. They are voting every year on ballot measures, for judges, and for candidates in state house races, county boards of supervisors, school boards, and district attorney. They are doing their homework and voting in primaries in order to advance candidates with the best politics and the best vision who are either viable in a general election or will put up the best possible fight in an unwinnable district. They are finding friends to run for office or running for office themselves.

Hunter S. Thompson ran for office. Noam Chomsky has written in favor of lesser-evil voting. Barack Obama’s first elected office was in the Illinois state house. Jimmy Carter served in the Georgia state senate before he was governor.

If you want better candidates, what are you doing to field them? What reasonable course of action works better without like-minded voters such as yourself turning out at the polls? This is a serious question.
posted by compartment at 7:07 AM on November 21, 2019 [22 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

Part of growing up for me was realizing that what seemed like marginal differences to me between political parties that all made abhorrent decisions could be the difference between life and death for people on the margins, especially kids growing up in poverty, to whom even an extra $10 in food stamps per month matters a lot. That’s who I think of when I have to go hold my nose and vote.

Unfortunately in the US I’ve seen people making the opposite move to Moore, going from “I guess I’ll go vote” to “lol nothing matters.”
posted by sallybrown at 7:15 AM on November 21, 2019 [21 favorites]

I think I can forgive Alan Moore for not voting on a national level, but considering the dire situation in Northamptonshire - council basically insolvent and putting vulnerable people at risk - Moore's late-stage intervention is embarrassing. His own personal status might have swung some local elections, with or without the chaos magic, which could have made huge differences to people in his home town.
posted by The River Ivel at 7:16 AM on November 21, 2019 [12 favorites]

voting does not absolve us all of the responsibility to do direct action. before chiding people for being late to the voting party, consider whether you've been doing enough in the streets.

if your political activity is limited to bourgeois electoral politics, you cannot consider yourself a respectable person.
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 7:20 AM on November 21, 2019 [19 favorites]

Part of growing up for me was realizing that what seemed like marginal differences to me between political parties that all made abhorrent decisions could be the difference between life and death for people on the margins

Not voting is also effectively a vote. Religious conservatives know this, and exercise this power when it works for them. If the party that is ostensibly closer to you needs to be sent a message, sometimes it makes sense in the medium to long term to send this message.
posted by Space Coyote at 7:24 AM on November 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

if your political activity is limited to bourgeois electoral politics, you cannot consider yourself a respectable person.

excuse me while i cackle wildly at this prime comment

just to check, is voting 'bourgeois electoral politics'? i need to calibrate my shame meter
posted by inire at 7:35 AM on November 21, 2019 [15 favorites]

i also need to figure out whether political activity that focuses solely on getting other people involved in 'bourgeois electoral politics' (i.e. by registering to vote) is itself bourgeois electoral politics, by virtue of the transitive property

because if so i have some important tweets to send
posted by inire at 7:40 AM on November 21, 2019 [3 favorites]

1. Good, vote. Yes please.

2. Claiming that the baseline is there being no difference between politicians and what they represent is how the fascists get things to this point to begin with. Obviously.
posted by Navelgazer at 7:52 AM on November 21, 2019 [7 favorites]

It was only from the comics I realized he was talking about the UK and not the US. Dire times for both nations.
posted by GoblinHoney at 8:00 AM on November 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

electoral systems don't yield the will of the people. they yield, for the most part, the will of the rich. it is a game that popular movements can sometimes sort of win, but it is not the sum total of political activity (indeed, it's only one very small part of it).
posted by Reclusive Novelist Thomas Pynchon at 8:01 AM on November 21, 2019 [8 favorites]

Less jokingly, I would like to say that it's bullshit that the Democratic party thinks it holds us hostage because the alternative is a party that will walk us back to the 1800s. In my opinion their ransom is worth paying, but no, I can't fault people who want more, who want politicians who will actually fight for them. The democrats need to do better.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 8:04 AM on November 21, 2019 [11 favorites]

electoral systems don't yield the will of the people. they yield, for the most part, the will of the rich. it is a game that popular movements can sometimes sort of win, but it is not the sum total of political activity (indeed, it's only one very small part of it).

partially true*, but not really relevant to whether voting is 'bourgeois' and whether voters who aren't doing some sort of non-bourgeois political activity (whatever that might be) might be able to consider themselves respectable persons

* 'the will of the people' doesn't exist, but assuming that it does for a moment, the UK electoral system is closer to yielding the will of the people than it is anything else (subject to criticisms of the FPTP system, etc.) - the problem is that the will of the people is subject to influence by the will of the rich, but that doesn't make it any less 'the will of the people' (unless you're heading down the 'people don't know their own will!' route, which has a, let's say, questionable history)
posted by inire at 8:15 AM on November 21, 2019 [5 favorites]

2. Claiming that the baseline is there being no difference between politicians and what they represent is how the fascists get things to this point to begin with. Obviously.

This is true. And that is the fault of the politicians.

This is also why the next president or PM who is NOT a fascist will absolutely have to make huge sweeping changes that will better everyone's lives. It will be imperative. If the population bands together to throw the fascists out and then nothing changes over the next four or five years, it will sink voter enthusiasm for a generation. Well, even further.

If the message people take from the next administration is that there is no difference for them no matter who is in power, then the fascists will continue to advance and Beard Wizard will be absolutely in the right for staying home on polling day.
posted by FakeFreyja at 8:36 AM on November 21, 2019 [6 favorites]

it will sink voter enthusiasm for a generation. Well, even further.

People are going to vote Labour in swathes to get remain, and they are going to be pretty unenthused if they get A, cos it seems unlikely to lead to B.
posted by biffa at 8:41 AM on November 21, 2019

Some actual data for the UK, based on research re engagement in any form of political activity, including but not limited to the deeply bourgeois act of voting - participating in demonstrations, campaigning, attending political meetings, involvement in online discussions etc. are all included.

Political disengagement in the UK: who is disengaged?

- The young - a majority of 18-24 year olds (compared to a minority of every other age bracket), per section 3.2.

- The non-white - "Ethnic minorities are generally less likely to vote than white people", per 4.4, with 11% lower turnout in 2017 (the research on whether they are more or less likely to engage in other forms of political activity is inconclusive, per 4.2).

- The working class - people from social grades C2, D and E (skilled manual workers, semi- and unskilled manual workers, and pensioners / casual or lowest grade workers / the unemployed, respectively) are dramatically less likely to participate in political activity, per 5.2.

If you feel it necessary to proclaim that those who only engage in bourgeois political activity 'cannot consider themselves respectable' (meaning that those who don't engage in any political activity are even worse..?), perhaps remember that in practice that statement is a) silly and b) targets the young, non-white, and working class, who are presumably not your intended targets.
posted by inire at 8:58 AM on November 21, 2019 [9 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

And Democrats are the real racists because they supported slavery*!

* in 1860
posted by klanawa at 9:00 AM on November 21, 2019 [6 favorites]

To reiterate most peoples' reaction to this news: ug. Yeah THANKS Alan...
posted by UltraMorgnus at 9:22 AM on November 21, 2019

I don't subscribe to the idea that the differences between the two major parties are so marginal that there's no point voting.

However, it seems pretty remarkable that if we look at two key issues for this election:

1: Brexit: that Leaving the EU will pauperise a shitload more people and keep all the people already pauperised in the shit.
2: Austerity: that will continue to pauperise a shitload more people and keep all the people already pauperised in the shit.

that we somehow don't have a major party in England & Wales who both want to remain and don't want to continue with austerity. That is insane. You literally can't vote for a party with these two eminently complementary policy goals and have a hope of then getting a seat if you don't live in Brighton.
posted by biffa at 9:36 AM on November 21, 2019 [7 favorites]

I think Labour want to resolve brexit in a way that can be seen to genuinely confer a mandate.

Much as I wish we could just forget all about it, the original Lib Dem Plan of "Just cancel it" didn't do that. It's not workable.

The Labour plan of negotiating as undamaging a Brexit as possible and then putting forward a referendum of two well defined choices (hopefully with legislation in place to automatically trigger one or the other depending on the outcome) is, so far as I can see the only workable solution to hopefully avoid Brexit altogether or to mitigate the damage of it.

What else could you actually realistically do?
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:02 AM on November 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

This drives me fucking crazy. Yes, the next presidential election is important. Yes, voting when huge issues are at stake is important. But even more important, at the basic, structural level of every election is voting in every single election (for assistant state district dog catcher, etc), even if it might seem meaningless to you.

Voting determines who wins and who doesn't win. But it's much more than that. Polling data drives the entire system. Exit polls and demographic breakdown of who turned out to vote is as important as who wins and who loses. Age brackets, race, sexual orientation, etc, etc etc. It matters. A lot.

I'm mixing US and UK politics here on purpose, but let's say Alan Moore is part of a demographic called Old Pasty Warlocks (OPWs). If, over the course of the last 20 elections, only 13% of OPWs showed up to vote—regardless of who won— then of course politicians in the upcoming election will find it safe to ignore— or at least back-burner—issues important to OPWs. Especially on local levels; there's tight budgets, very limited bandwidth to get messaging out, and only 24 hours in a day. So OPWs get sent to the back, issues-wise.

We could use any demographic group for this. Recent local election in Chicago reported 13% of youngest bracket (18-30, if I remember correctly) of voters bothered to vote. With appalling numbers like that, why would any local politician spend time reaching out to the youngest voters, unless they could find an overlap in interests with a group that votes at 60%? Should politicians work for everyone? Yes. But this isn't a perfect world, there is limited money and time and effort. So you pander towards the groups with reliable turnout.

The result? Groups that historically don't vote then end up "unenthusiastic" or "not excited" by electoral choices. It's self-perpetuating.

More powerful seats like State senate, to House Reps to Senate, to Gov, to President almost all come up through this system that starts locally. Or at least their team members and powerful advisors and donors and supporters come up through this system that starts locally.

It's enormously important to vote in EVERY election. Politics doesn't just happen in November every 4 or 8 years. It's a daily thing, with political teams watching small polls and exit polls from everywhere, all the time. Is November 2020 important? Yes, but I hate to see such gigantic emphasis on these national elections that only happen once in a while for offices that are far away from local affairs.

Your vote counts even if your candidate loses, or even if you hate both candidates. Or even if you've never even heard of the offices the elections are being held for.

tl, dr: go vote next November. But more importantly, vote in every election, and get young people to vote in every election. Small-elections are ignored by so many, and then bigger elections with more at stake are held without enough input from where it matters: Locally.
posted by SoberHighland at 10:17 AM on November 21, 2019 [11 favorites]

People do realize that Moore's imperfect statement is going to have a far bigger positive impact on driving people to the polls than countless dozens of well-intentioned bromides about "responsibly performing your civic duty" ever would, right?
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:19 AM on November 21, 2019 [6 favorites]

The result? Groups that historically don't vote then end up "unenthusiastic" or "not excited" by electoral choices. It's self-perpetuating.

There's another side of that, though, which is that if politicians could really assume every voter would reliably support the marginally preferable candidate, there would be little incentive for them to maintain any kind of ideological commitment. I think most people would say the best mechanism available to address this in the American system is primaries - which is why I am a proponent of using primaries for all the political leverage they're worth.

I think a lot of people on the left right now have some sort of theory of political change that involves activating non-voters. I think:

a.) this really does have to be done
b.) it's easier said than done, for sure.
posted by atoxyl at 11:27 AM on November 21, 2019

People do realize that Moore's imperfect statement is going to have a far bigger positive impact on driving people to the polls than countless dozens of well-intentioned bromides about "responsibly performing your civic duty" ever would, right?

by virtue of being a public statement by a moderately well-known figure in the context of a particularly crucial election, it'll arguably have a bigger positive impact than 40 years of Moore dutifully and quietly voting in every election (assuming that he hasn't spent those 40 years issuing public statements about how voting is for chumps, which would balance or outweigh the positive impact of this statement)

in fact, for a particularly spicy take, i'd argue that this statement is given substantial additional weight by the fact that he hadn't voted for 40 years - this election is so important he's breaking the habit of a lifetime - so the 40 years of non-voting, far from being a minor negative, is actually a net positive!
posted by inire at 11:34 AM on November 21, 2019 [4 favorites]

JFC this is a post about Alan Moore Recommending to vote for Labour party in the UK.

Despite it's endless relevance to the entire world, can we not have it degenerate into ANOTHER USA: Democratic presidential candidate:morality or pragmatism swamp again?
posted by lalochezia at 12:36 PM on November 21, 2019 [13 favorites]

Dear metafilter,
I am cranky and fighting with people I mostly agree with today. Please accept my apology and this invisible cookie. I will attempt to be nicer in future.
posted by evilDoug at 12:36 PM on November 21, 2019 [6 favorites]

Lots of self-righteous people in this thread forgetting which party got you in to the Iraq War.

Granted I'm speaking from the US. But back in 2016, I had a choice between voting for someone who supported the Iraq War, and voting for someone who had no political experience whatsoever, who had bankrupted all of his businesses, who regularly mocked women, the disabled, and people of color, and was by all appearances about as dumb as a box of hair. And I have to be honest, voting for someone who had supported the Iraq War gave me NO QUALMS WHATSOEVER.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:44 PM on November 21, 2019 [12 favorites]

What else could you actually realistically do?

The problem with their approach is that they have been so fence sitting that the narrative about Brexit has been dominated by the tories and Farage's parties, with hardly any strong voices setting out the obvious benefits of staying in the EU. So we've had years of the case for Brexit, and hardly anything making the case for remain. which seems likely to have a major impact should any kind of second referendum come to pass.

The bigger problem is that Labour elected a Brexit favouring leader and he has been totally half arsed in making the case for remain for the four years or so that the debacle has been going on. The lack of a firm drive for Remain may well have caused the Leave majority in the first place. He seems likely to stay half-arsed for the foreseeable future.

So Labour could have spent the last three years making the case they didn't make before. That there were huge benefits to being in the EU and that we were going to lose them if we left, even under a more positive scenario, like a Norway solution. Their failure to make any kind of case has allowed the Overton widow to shift from Norway to Switzerland to Canada to somehow, astonishingly, no deal being seen as desirable by a huge fraction of the population and people wanting to get it done with little idea of what that actually means. That's on Labour because they did fuck all to stop it. Their job was to be the opposition, but they opposed nothing. The consensus they win is in danger of being the worst possible terms for exiting the EU.
posted by biffa at 1:04 PM on November 21, 2019 [9 favorites]

And Democrats are the real racists because they supported slavery*!

*glances furtively at Libya
posted by Reyturner at 1:16 PM on November 21, 2019 [2 favorites]

electoral systems don't yield the will of the people. they yield, for the most part, the will of the rich.

Yes, when people who don't share the values of the rich refuse to vote, the rich do have an easy time winning elections. The problem with popular movements isn't that they are ineffective, it's that they are ephemeral. Even if you can get enough people on board for one or two election cycles, people disengage pretty damn quick, progress stalls, and we end up right back where we started.

It's a lot easier when you can make it someone's actual paid job to realign society to your vision because they'll keep putting in the effort when the other side has declared victory and mostly gone home.
posted by wierdo at 2:15 PM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

tbh even other people's wombs, climate and deportation paperwork should be sufficient

That's exactly what I meant. "Not a disaster" is absolutely enough because you are preventing what would be a serious disaster for some people even if those people are not you.
posted by Miko at 3:36 PM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

...without having read TFA, I gotta say that if he doesn't understand that not voting for a leader doesn't mean you don't get a leader, I don't think I can take anything he's written seriously as trying to convey some kind of message that someone who'd thought about things would communicate.
posted by taquito sunrise at 4:01 PM on November 21, 2019 [1 favorite]

"politicians are just in it for themselves" is stupid because they are in it for themselves, and different parties will enact different policies. Exactly why they enact those policies (cynicism, idealism, plutocracy, whatever) matters less nearly not at all compared to what the actual policies are!! If you actually hate all the policies of all the parties equally, sure I guess. But then vote in primaries and leadership elections instead.

Like, "doctors are just in it for themselves, so I don't go to doctors appointments" is self-evidently stupid.
posted by BungaDunga at 4:37 PM on November 21, 2019 [7 favorites]

Politics is fucking hard because unless you, yes *you* get involved and get in there and move the discussion in the direction of *you* over many years it's going to seem like none of these asshole candidates represent anything you believe in until one day you have some crazy ass person elected and you're like "how the hell did this person get into power?" and the answer is really, well, crazy ass people have been showing up and moving the discussion in the direction of *them* for many years while you stayed home feeling superior and above it all and here we are.

The equivalent of Moore's actions here in the U.S. are the dozens of people I know who are long term resident, non-citizens, who were moved to become citizens and voters after Trump. Which is great and all, but you were here for 20 years, you stood by for the war on drugs, the war in Iraq, Bush I, Bush II, -- maybe it would be nice to not be so far behind the eight ball now and getting you registered to vote to prevent the total implosion of everything. Maybe politics and elections are about slowly pushing the boulder in the direction you want with sustained action over a long period of effort and maybe if you don't get exactly what you want in one election and then you run and hide and say "fuck it all" and let the other guys get what they want for 40 years, then maybe you are the asshole.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 11:15 PM on November 21, 2019 [9 favorites]

Metafilter: have you been in a fucking laudanum fugue this whole time, you pasty warlock?

I am attempting to take up embroidery as a hobby and was just wondering which specific snarky MF comment should be my first project. Thanks, thread!
posted by Bella Donna at 9:58 AM on November 22, 2019 [8 favorites]

People are imperfect. I'm glad when they grow and do the right thing.
posted by bongo_x at 1:59 PM on November 22, 2019 [4 favorites]

If you can't put on a Guy Fawkes mask and blow up parliament well then why even vote.
posted by benzenedream at 7:42 AM on November 24, 2019 [3 favorites]