There’s an election coming up so I elected to write about it, with a focus on the slogans we are fed on the myriad billboards that are colourfully decorating our roadsides.
Elections are funny things. They often make a lot of us get a bit hot under the collar and angry with others, including our family and friends. Of course, we all think we are right and things would be better if they were done our way. However, a certain amount of critical thinking is often required to give us enough facts (not alternative ones) to form our opinions on which to base our voting choices.
And then I look at the billboards, and the language they use to try and persuade us, which must cost the parties thousands of dollars in publicity company bills. Blimey! I could do it better for mere hundreds, by using phrases that actually mean something like, “Let’s have a wealth tax” or “No more mines on the conservation estate”. Instead, I see short pithy phrases like the Greens’ slogan, “Now is the time.” What on earth does that mean? Time for what? It’s a bit like the old Bunnings slogan, “Lower prices are just the beginning.” The beginning of what for god’s sake. Please tell us more! Or Labour’s latest, “In it for you.” What is ‘it’? When I saw that, the first thing I thought was, do you mean, “In the sh*t for you”? Their PR team certainly needs a wake-up call. And what about NZ First’s one, “Let’s take back our country”? Really? Is this trying to incite fear in us? Fear that we have lost something? So, who took NZ and where did they take it to? The last time I looked, it was still 2,000 kilometres south-east of Australia. I suppose Winny would have a very pertinent answer to these very probing questions. More fearmongering is evident in the one which has popped up at Brophy’s Beach in bright red above a National party billboard shouting “Stop centralised planning”, which of course is playing on our fear of “Soviet- style central planning” as written in the NZ Taxpayers Union literature. My god! Are the Commies coming again? I mean the Vietnam war was fought because of this fear, and even though the US lost this contrived war nearly 50 years ago I am still waiting for the dreaded Commie hoards to come pouring over the horizon to control us.
What’s going on? Why do we fall for all this political propaganda? Why do our politicians use fear to persuade us to think like they do? Why do some of us allow this fear to influence our decisions? It really is time for a change! (Vote for me! Oh sorry I forgot. I’m not on the ballot form). I would welcome a politician who speaks of unity, considered compromise and integrity, rather than the divisive energy of fear that seems to dominate today; one who encourages us to nut things out together, not always agreeing but respectfully listening to others’ points of view and doing appropriate research to reach conclusions.
I remember around 25 years ago when my neighbours used to host an election night party every three years. On arrival we were offered a corsage of the colour of the party we supported. We proudly pinned them onto our chests and entered the fray. It was all great fun. Most of the corsages were blue, the preferred colour of our hosts and their friends, a few were red and there were just two green ones, one they always reserved for me, and another in case someone had changed their allegiance since the last election party. There were even a couple of black ones just in case, but I don’t remember them ever being chosen. I sometimes wore two, a red and a green depending on the policies put forward.
All the guests chatted in a congenial way and despite harbouring differing ideas, we listened to one another and sometimes reached consensus on controversial issues, or agreed to disagree and when the results were announced at the end of the night, nobody threw themselves off the balcony or pulled out an AK47 to smoke the opposition guests (as might happen in the US). I feel that, despite all the differences in opinion we have here in NZ, many of us listen and discuss and cast our vote at least partially conscious of what we are voting for, despite the meaningless garble we see on the billboards, and despite the many pre-election promises that are broken once a party is in power. Most promises, like the need for capital gains, wealth and other taxes, environmental protective measures like halting gold exploration on protected land or limiting new fossil fuel development, or banning bottom trawling, appear to me to be broken for political expediency and probably after heavy industry lobbying. But hey, what do I know? I am just an ordinary naïve citizen living here in the Coromandel, not at the Beehive, who half believes the hype when deciding who to vote for, but who is cynically ready for the broken promises.
Here is a haiku (a short Japanese poem of 17 syllables) that kind of summarises the above:
Election billboards shout, “We want change, vote for us”. But none make me smile.
Article by Ross Liggins
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