Red vs Blue

This is worth talking about. 

My own country seems to have voted itself into an effective one party system (with the media/propaganda reels repeatedly trying to enforce the idea of a weak opposition down our throats), and, well, everything sucks. 

This is how it is: the overwhelming majority of all humans are idiots. I'm talking crushingly, brutally painfully uneducated, unaware and ignorant. Sometimes this ignorance is *deliberate,* because it's better off not being aware of how horribly you were lied to about, say, £350 million per week? 

I wilfully include myself amongst the ingnorant masses, because I know that I don't have all the answers. The truth of it is, there are some people who make it their life's work to know better than us, though often those same folk are plain old, fallible, corruptible humans.

I get it - most of the time it's better to stay safe in your little bubble, and vote for your own selfish needs. The world is a scary place and you probably don't feel as though your voice is being heard. It can be overwhelming and unpleasant to say the least. If you live in any place that pretends to be a democracy, you technically are given a platform to make your voice heard, and that platform is your vote. What they don't tell you is how cripplingly flawed this system is and how it is in no way representative of your viewpoints at all. 

So you can speak up if you wish, but you're not allowed to act surprised if your vote turns out to be an act of hilarious self sabotage, ala Brexit.

I overhead someone proudly proclaiming that he votes exclusively for himself and his needs - I had to leave the room. He was an old man (which doesn't automatically equate someone to being stupid, over the hill or out of touch, btw), but I was ready to fucking punch him. This lack of awareness absolutely highlights how utterly broken our voting system is - people are intentionally or unintentionally aware that their vote affects everyone else.

Like it or not,we're all in this together, and what you vote for could make your life harder for you,even when your politicians are proclaiming otherwise. "Your Vote" really isn't yours at all. Thanks to our two-party system, everything is either Blue or Red, so your vote can hugely damage the otherside. But society isn't one or the other, it's freaking purple and to vote selfishly will affect everyone, regardless of your intentions. Just as voting selflessly does the same. 

In case you're not seeing a pattern here yet, the system is broken. Dividing an insanely diverse country like ours into two camps is not at all representative of the people who live here. Only 51.9% of the people who voted wanted to leave the EU. My country has a population of 65.14 MILLION people, and only 17.41 million voted for to leave. Not everyone voted of course, but how is it fair that only just over half of the voters get to decide what happens to the rest of us? Put yourself on the other side and think how you would feel. Is this a decisive victory? A crushing blow to the opposition? Is it, as Führer May proclaims "the will of the people"? 

Since when was it OK for a tiny majority to enforce their will on 16.14 million people who voted remain, let alone the millions of others who did not, or could not vote. Isn't oppression of the masses dangerously close to a dictatorship?

Of course, a primary cause of this mess is the media. Idiot people who seem to be OK with enforcing their will on millions of others rely on the media to get their tasty confirmation bias. Or perhaps they just vote without ever acquiring additional information, believing that they know best. [Hint: they don't.] 

How is it that in the so-called information age, people aren't aware that getting their news from a single source is bad? The world is not simple. It's not Us vs Them. It's important to read multiple sources on the same topic, due to the simple fact that people have agendas. This especially includes consuming media that doesn't agree with your point of view. 

Even the "anti-fake news" movement is a form of censorship. Censorship has historically proven itself to a grand tool of dictators and oppressors, and whilst it's very true that false information can be harmful, my entire point here is that once again, this isn't a yes or no issue. 

Satire exists. In an age where reality is more ridiculous than fiction, humour is a useful mirror on society and, for many, a coping mechanism. How does one differentiate "fake news" from an article about how Führer May is an evil lizard person?

Who judges what is worthy of news? More importantly, what makes these judges qualified to do so in the first place? If they do know better as one would hope, then I need to be informed as to how and why they know better. What experience do they have with this sort of thing, and can they explain the issue to my tiny ignorant mind in a way that I might understand it?

Honestly, all this is why I can't wait for the robots to take over. Humans spend too long violently flinging their shit at one another, whilst proudly defending their stick in the ground. That would be the very same ground they've polluted beyond repair, fouling the one and only nest they have. 

You put a impartial AI in charge to asses all possible viewpoints, options and solutions in a time faster than humans are capable of thinking, and then we might get somewhere with this whole society thing.

Is it really a case of "deal with it, because this is the best we've got," or can we really change the system for the better, so that more voices can be fairly heard and represented? Do you recognise a broken, flawed system in a democracy that seems doomed towards becoming a one-party state where Mother Knows Best, or do you truly, honestly not care? 

The next time you vote selfishly, consider how long it is until someone else forces their point of view on you, and see whether or not you feel that is "a fair system."