The 2017 UK General Election Thread - Voting open today from 7am - 10pm

[That]

To be fair, I think if they've gone so far as to make a statement like that then Diane Abbott may well be quite ill, and in that case I genuinely wish her all the best.

I agree to get this out there on the last day of the campaign while she's being attacked is shrewd and convenient, but it doesn't mean we should sympathise less. She's not some kind of horrible Tory monster ( ), she's just bad at her job, so now she's not doing that job any more (for whatever reason) I hope the media leave her alone.

[OrangeRKN]

Imagine someone who has no knowledge of the various political parties or any of their policies or manifesto pledges. Would you still encourage that person to go out and vote?

I think everyone should make an informed vote - but given the choice between an uninformed vote or no vote at all, I'd prefer the latter. An uninformed vote only dilutes the effect of an informed one.

This hypothetical person doesn’t really exist though do they? Or are you saying that there are people out there with no knowledge of any of the parties that can be persuaded to go and vote, while still not bothering to look into the parties?

If anybody out there is so ignorant that they have no idea at all of the parties or policies, they are not going to go and vote based on a Facebook message of “Go and vote you lazy banana split or else I will bore you to death by explaining what Tu quoque means ”.

It's a hypothetical person and yes, it's doubtful that a real-life example of a completely uninformed person would ever be persuaded to go out and vote. I don't think it's a meaningless question to ask though, in the context of deciding whether increasing voter turnout is a good thing.

The base assumption is that higher voter turnout is good for a healthy democracy. The more people that vote, the more representative parliament is of the people. But to address the hypothetical I would say, and I think that many people would agree, that it is not a good idea for a completely uninformed person to vote. It doesn't improve the parliament's representation of the people because such a vote would be (as we've set up the scenario) arbitrary.

Logically this sets you up to then ask - what if the person now has incredibly little knowledge of the different parties and their policies, so little as to be the minimum possible without being /completely/ uninformed? Is any level of interest/knowledge/opinion enough to make encouraging that person to vote a good idea? Again I would say no.

What that establishes is that there is probably some minimum level of being informed at which you'd want someone to be before they commit to voting - some point at which encouraging them to vote would in fact increase parliament's representation of the people.

Trying to strictly define that is going to be hard and open for much debate, but we don't need to for the original hypothetical question to have been of use to us. Following through the above logic we can conclude that it is not enough to just encourage more people to vote and to try to increase voter turnout, but it's also important to encourage more people to become better informed on politics and the policies of those they are voting for.

tl;dr, I'd change Karl's "Everyone should vote, it's really important." into "Everyone should find out about their candidates and the parties and vote, it's really important."

[Moggy]

OR, that is a very long winded way of saying "Labour good, Tory bad, everyone should know this".

[OrangeRKN]

tory bad, vandals good

[That]

politics bad, videogames good

[Hexx]

Playstation good, Xbrick bad

?

[Moggy]

Hexx bad, Cal good.

[OrangeRKN]

Time to write my GRview political opinion piece where I draw extended parallels between the three main UK parties and the three big console companies.

UKIP are Ouya if you were wondering

[Blue Eyes]

What ever happened to Cal?

[Hexx]

twitter.com/HackneyAbbott/status/872417084277493761

(Edit Holy moly she sends a lot of tweets..even like..10 in the last 2 hours?)

Two bob says if Lab win she'll manage to stumble from her sick bed for victory celebration

Might just be my opinion - but is it all a bit quite now? Everyone seems resigned to the voters having made up their minds?

[Moggy]

Might just be my opinion - but is it all a bit quite now? Everyone seems resigned to the voters having made up their minds?

It shows how crazy the election has been if it counts as quiet when the day before the election the newspapers accuse one of the top contenders of being a jihadi and the shadow home secretary is replaced.

[Glowy69]

Just spoke to my sister and asked her who she was voting for.

Tory.
I ask why.
She legit says "its the only stable option"

I asked her to provide some sort of piece of evidence that makes her think this will be the case. I havent heard from her for 5 hours.

[Hexx]

Might just be my opinion - but is it all a bit quite now? Everyone seems resigned to the voters having made up their minds?

It shows how crazy the election has been if it counts as quiet when the day before the election the newspapers accuse one of the top contenders of being a jihadi and the shadow home secretary is replaced.

Yeah suppose. Just feels no one is "swinging" anymore (ooooo.gif) and everyone made up their minds days/weeks ago.

Doesn't feel like a nail biting finish.

[Hexx]

Speaking of nail biting finishes - anyone not put forward a prediction yet?

t:uk-general-election-sweepstakes---win-10-for-charity

[Denster]

Just spoke to my sister and asked her who she was voting for.

Tory.
I ask why.
She legit says "its the only stable option"

I asked her to provide some sort of piece of evidence that makes her think this will be the case. I havent heard from her for 5 hours.

Is she single?

[Garth]

Just spoke to my sister and asked her who she was voting for.

Tory.
I ask why.
She legit says "its the only stable option"

I asked her to provide some sort of piece of evidence that makes her think this will be the case. I havent heard from her for 5 hours.

My sister just gave me a vague "they all never really do what they say" and "I hate politics" answer when I asked who she was voting for ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I suppose it's good she didn't parrot the "strong and stable" line. She lives in Peterborough and her husband is a member of the Conservative snooker club

Maybe she's a shy Tory now

[Moggy]

Might just be my opinion - but is it all a bit quite now? Everyone seems resigned to the voters having made up their minds?

It shows how crazy the election has been if it counts as quiet when the day before the election the newspapers accuse one of the top contenders of being a jihadi and the shadow home secretary is replaced.

Yeah suppose. Just feels no one is "swinging" anymore (ooooo.gif) and everyone made up their minds days/weeks ago.

Doesn't feel like a nail biting finish.

Campaign wise it’s pretty much dead, but there might be some excitement tomorrow night when the results come in. Poll wise it could be anywhere from a narrow Labour win to a massive Tory majority. I have never known such wildly differing polls before, absolutely crazy stuff.

[Glowy69]

Just spoke to my sister and asked her who she was voting for.

Tory.
I ask why.
She legit says "its the only stable option"

I asked her to provide some sort of piece of evidence that makes her think this will be the case. I havent heard from her for 5 hours.

Is she single?

She's a twat. And she's married mate coz

[Blue Eyes]

Country's strawberry floated. Give up hoping now. Save yourselves.

[Moggy]

Just to even things up with Denster, a lady at work was unsure whether to vote Tory or Labour (or "red and blue" as she called it). I persuaded her that Labour were the better bet for her as she has young kids and Labour will be better for education and schools.