Party politics: Marine pollution

On March 3rd, 2010, The New Statesman contained an article which stated that, according to the Electoral Commission, 56 % of 17 – 25 year-olds have not bothered to register for voting.
They will, however, sign Avaaz petitions.

Avaaz is an international grouping of people who have signed up to its petitions to bring peace to Gaza, http://www.avaaz.org/en/gaza_time_for_peace/
to save the oceans from over-fishing, the BBC from Murdoch, to protect endangered civilians in the Congo,
to protest against Jewish settlements in Palestinian territory,
Iranian internet black-out,
and, perhaps most frequently, to urge action on climate change.
We could summarise Avaaz’s relationship to the non-electorate as follows:

British General Election ignores global poison. Young people ignore British General Election.

On February 24th, 2010, the Telegraph on line contained a post by Ed Cumming, taking a stance as typical of eighteen-year-olds for whom 2010 offered the first General Election in which they were entitled to vote. He used the post to announce he will not be bothering to vote, because none of the parties are interested in the issues which concern him.

“The thought of Brown staying in charge makes most of us want to oblige the fate prophesised (sic) for us and jump into the nearest wheelie bin to die from drugs.
…
“Yet David Cameron, slick with PR oil, is almost as unelectable. The polls appear to be noticing this, finally, but we’ve been saying it for years.”

Incompetent Brown, untrustworthy Cameron.

Bad luck, handsome David Cameron, they sussed you had air-brushed your poster
Poor Gordon Brown Charles Clarke - a man who seems to hate with passion anyone who isn’t Charles Clarke – is rounding on Gordon Brown again.

On March 3rd, I received an email from Avaaz, asking me for my signature on a petition to the British government to create a marine protection area round the Chagos islands in the Indian Ocean.
The email states “The reports are dire: in 38 years our oceans could be completely fished out; in 100 years, all coral reefs might be dead.”

In the few minutes I took to write these paragraphs, between 30 and 40 signatures were added to the Avaaz petition.

Need we say more?

Yes, because it is not only young people who condemn the petty squabblings of our pathetic politicians. It is all of us.

There is a real possibility that we human beings will render the earth uninhabitable before those who are eighteen this year reach their life expectancy term.

Somehow we need to sideline these Brownlets and Cameronlets, and bring in democracy. Then the young people, and the old people, and the middle-aged people, will take part in a new politics, and possibly even save the world.

Shall we vote? Or save the oceans?