After several weeks of campaigning, during which the truly vicious nature of the right-wing press was exposed for all to see, and the ineptitude of today’s allegedly wonderful Tory Party was paraded before the electorate not as a clueless leader propped up by minders and soundbites, but as the salvation of a once-great nation, the day has come when We The People have the final say. The time has come to vote.
But many people, especially young people, may say, what’s the point? What difference will their vote make? How can they alone effect change? Won’t the world look more or less the same the morning after polling day, wherever they put their cross? I mean, look at all those really important things that could take up the whole day and mean there was no time to go and vote. Like, er, sitting around and whining that voting makes no difference.
And that, in a nutshell, is why we get Governments chosen by older voters - because they are the ones prepared to go out and vote. That is why young people get saddled with student debt, unable to even afford the deposit for houses and often dependant on older relatives to give them a helping hand. It will stay that way with the certainty of night following day unless more of those younger people get out and vote.
What will also be a reassuring constant in our lives will be the propagandising, bullying, intrusion, monstering, blagging, dustbin-rifling, hate-mongering, lying, deceiving, sneering, swaggering, and uncaringly self-serving behaviour of our free and fearless press. Should the Tories be returned to power, Theresa May will be a prisoner of the Fourth Estate, dancing to their tune, doing their bidding and powerless to curb their excesses.
Or, of course, if you don’t want that to happen, you could go and vote.
And what will also happen if the Tories get that increased majority is the sound, starting just after 2200 hours tonight, of their supporters cat-calling, yah-booing, leering, and generally lording it over anyone of dissenting view. “We won, haw haw haw, you lost, suck it up, aren’t we just so f***ing clever?” will be one of the more coherent Tory cries.
Some who are not part of the £80,000 plus a year club, not part of the press, pundit or Westminster establishment, will also cheer, mistakenly believing that they, in voting Tory, have done the right thing, their patriotic duty. They will have been had for mugs. The Tories won’t give a flying foxtrot about them - until the next General Election.
Many will believe the Tory spin on Brexit, that Theresa May, David Davis, Boris Johnson and Liam Fox are a credible negotiating team. Anyone believing that is beyond deluded. Jean-Claude Juncker, Michel Barnier and their pals will have the hapless Brits for breakfast - and our country will suffer grievously as a result.
Polls show a Tory lead - partly because they are weighted in the assumption that many younger and less well off voters will not go to the polls. There is only one way to prove them wrong, and that is to get out there and vote (did I mention that already?).
It is entirely possible that your vote will not make a difference. But by not bothering, you turn that possibility into a nailed-on certainty. There is only one way to effect change, and that is to go and vote today. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
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