doesn't that make you shiver; the way things could have gone...
I was thinking, today, about how some people have no interest in politics, say it doesn't matter, or that it's all the same, and mock others who do care. I came home and was reading Looking for Alibrandi and one passage particularly struck me as important. It is, if not the entire reason (because when does anyone ever have just one reason for anything), a big part of why I think and speak and act as I do. (It is only dialogue; I cut out the descriptive writing for brevity.)
"I felt lucky. Because we have a choice, and I think that we vote, not to get the best party in, but to keep the worst party out. Because we can stand here and protest. We can get all riled up about the Premier's ideas. We can say he's a dickhead even. We can call the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition one as well.
We can scream and shout and protest and even burn our flag if we want to. Because we're free to do whatever we want to do and if we break the law we get a fair trial. But in some countries, people can't do that. They can't go out in places like Martin Place and protest. In some countries people our age can't concentrate on their schoolwork or their lives because of the sound of gunfire.
In some countries they have one-party systems and they have things called the People's Army and when the people come out and have a say like we're doing today - scream and shout and voice their opinion - the People's Army shoots the people. Young people like us.
So, great. Let's be apathetic. Let's not vote. Let's let anyone run this country. Let's all be ignorant and all be proud of that ignorance. And maybe we'll have a People's Army one day too."