Hello friends of democracy,
We would like to invite you to a Canadians Advocating Political Participation (CAPP) Vancouver Day of Dialogue forum on democracy this Saturday, May 15th @1pm @the Unity Church in Vancouver - 5840 Oak St. Near the Canada Line.
The goals of this participatory forum are:
1) To identify the factors leading to voter disengagement and to develop tangible actions to address such disengagement.
2) To develop strategies that raise critical awareness of political issues.
3) To develop capacity for community-based pro-democracy efforts in Metro Van.
This is a follow-up event to the "At Issue" dialogue we facilitated with Andrew Coyne last week. www.youtube.com/CAPPVancouver
For more information please email galewis44@gmail.com
Hope to see you Saturday!
CAPP Vancouver
http://canadaparticipates.ca/
This might be doable by me. The time frame is right and I can take my bike.
The reason no one is engaged is because the system does not respond. People have found it to be a waste of time to get involved in politics unless they are power hungry politicians who wish to hold an office. For those who want practical solutions to everyday problems this system gives nothing.
It was designed so that there could be a ruling class by Englishmen of the eighteenth century as their own wilderness fiefdom.
The country is four thousand miles across and its system of government response to populist movement was almost a non issue. It took a whole season to cross it from one end to another. Soon it would only be days when the railway became functional. The idea of a populist driven parliamentary democracy was not even formed yet and the American Republican experiment was in its infancy. Our country's government was designed as a political playground for nobility. Of course in today's world the party is the ruling class instrument.
There can be no engagement of the masses, in my opinion, unless we revolutionize our system of government to engage the population. Their is absolutely no reason why, especially seeing as Canada is a world leader in communications, we can't come up with some form of direct democracy, while not straying too far from what we have now.
Check out my concept Technology Assisted Direct Democracy
There is absolutely no reason to give the elected members the vote on any matters as there was when communications took weeks and few people could read or engage due to lack of education. What must be taken into account is the propensity for political elements to able to hijack the agenda unless a certain threshold of participation is reached. By having the elected member always there to participate for us he will be responsive to his electorate and party politics may fall by the wayside. It may the perfect relationship, forever removing the paralyzing effect of party politics and reaching the true popular heart of democracy.
Why should the likes of Rahim Jaffer and all the hacks and former has beens including Brian bullshit Mulroney be able to score off whom they know? That sits squarely across any path where democracy might wish to travel. Who would need these friggen lobbyists if the people held the power? Who would be entertained by all this bullshit about documents, Helena Guergis and everything that the CBC throws at us as entertainment, if the people held the power? One quick vote and the government would be handing over the papers and there would be no Jaffer affairs because he would not be in business squeezing out favors from former associates. His wife would have had nop reason to lend him her blackberry and members of parliament would be busy pleasing their constituents by giving them feedback about how they see the upcoming legislation affecting them, pretty much telling them how they will vote and why so that the citizens can step up and change it by voting how they like in time for the upcoming bill.
I don't envision too much more participation immediately in such a system but the change will come in training and calling for a different sort of parliamentarian. Maybe more men and women who can stand on their own two feet and actually produce some high caliber work for their constituents not just vote according to party doctrine. We are suffering from a terminal lack of talent in this system. Only a few megalomaniacs and their yes men get to make policy and they do it with the main purpose of staying in power in mind, not what is good for the country or its citizens.
The reason we do have party politics now is because people are born with a political gene and the left and right needs to express their natural propensity as seen through the filters they are born with. This only accounts for fifty percent of our population. Those born without a political filter of mixed political persuasion, the other fifty percent become disengaged in our present polarized system. In the USA almost exactly 50% stay home.
It is our system which elevates the parties to power which also disengages our rational middle from participating because only the polar extremes get to wield power, only for their purposes which primarily include a lock on power.
I once did a study published in the English version of al Jezeera. "Do humans have a political gene?"
It seems to be a little too far for my communications abilities, so I will forgo this meeting too. That is why we would do well to be able to have our political say often from the comfort of our own home. Don't need to have a of verbose input, rather I want a yea or nay on all issues. Shoddy legislation won't get support and the government won't fall, just move on to the next order of business.
I kind of think the meeting will be full of political wannabes of the polarized persuasion, anyways. These things usually are because all political people can't get enough of hearing themselves talk so very little of intelligence ever gets said. .
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