If you’re in the UK, I’m sure it hasn’t escaped you that we have a general election coming up. You couldn’t miss it if you wanted to (I’m pretty sure that most of us actually would prefer that).
Normally, I don’t do politics. But this week that’s what I want to write about – don’t worry though, this is not a post in favour of any political party. It’s not telling you which way you should vote. That’s up to you.
The thing I want to talk about is what a waste of time the whole thing is.
How can I possibly say that when this has been described as ‘the most important election in a generation’ (I’ve got a feeling they’ve probably said that about every election)? Let me explain…
A bit of background
It’s now twenty years since I went to university to complete my degree, a third of which was politics.
I hadn’t studied politics before. I hadn’t even paid much heed to all the shenanigans going on in the news at that time. It was the Blair years, and quite honestly I couldn’t have given a flying one about who was in charge, as long as they weren’t messing up day-to-day life for me.
It took less than a month of study, in the very first term, to realise that politics wasn’t for me. I had absolutely no interest in it and the more I learned, the more tedious it all became.
Frankly, the whole subject feels completely detached from the real world.
That might seem like a strange thing to say, given that the political system is churning out decisions that can have consequences for our everyday lives.
But have you seen the state of the people involved?
The truth is, I can’t bear politics for the same reasons I can’t bear to watch The Apprentice any more: everyone involved seems like an utter nob.
In the early days, I thought is was going to enjoy The Apprentice, but it soon began to grind my gears. Buffoons, seemingly devoid of any real world experience – and in many cases talent – bluster their way through various scenarios using tactics that are frequently dishonest, manipulative and always self-serving.
The face you’ll find yourself making when you hear any of them talk…
Levels of self-promotion know no bounds, and all of them are too narcissistic to be able to cooperate with one another. Any brief alliances soon dissolve away when the opportunity arises to stick the knife in the other person’s back. At the end of the day, personal gain seems to trump everything for these people.
The contestants appear to be walking, talking caricatures, and the sort of people who – even though you may have the misfortune of coming across in the real world from time to time – you’d avoid like the plague.
And sadly, so it seems, the same can be said about the world of politics. The vast majority of our politicians exactly fit the bill of everything I’ve been saying these last couple of paragraphs. Anyone who thinks that this applies only to one particular party is very much deluded. It’s across the entire spectrum.
The game our politicians think they’re playing
No doubt there are some good people who go into politics, hoping to make a difference. But it seems they soon get sucked into the political machine.
For many politicians, politics seems to be a game. Say what you think people want to hear, dodge difficult questions, get lots of healthy self-promotion, score points criticising your opponents whether justified or not. And, after plugging away at these challenges for long enough, you might have won enough tokens to cash it all in at an election and call yourself an MP. That’s how they think it works.
Sadly though, everyone is getting more and more disenfranchised with the whole sorry circus. When was the last time you saw a politician who actually behaved like a normal person? When did you last hear one of them speak in a way that would be acceptable in any ordinary work or social environment?
Would you want to have any of them as work colleagues? I certainly wouldn’t.
How anyone can be interested in it is beyond me. But then, like The Apprentice, it clearly does appeal to some people.
One of the greatest high-five attempts ever
Even the people interested in it seem to be wrong’uns
Sadly, the people who are really interested in politics are also part of the problem.
If you’re unfortunate enough to be on Facebook, you’ll be familiar with this one. A certain set of people draw their old familiar battle lines right at the start of the election. “I’m red, you’re blue, let’s get ready for a fight”.
It wouldn’t matter to any of them who is in charge – they’re going to back their team and their Facebook feed for the remaining weeks is going to be one long stream of party propaganda.
These people seem to robotically see and share whatever they can that fits their own blinkered view. Doesn’t matter the context, doesn’t matter the facts – just share that stuff.
Papers and websites that ordinarily wouldn’t see the light of day are all of a sudden shareable sources.
Every news event is a case study in why their own party’s dogma should be supported. Much of it also comes with the bonus of being an opportunity to insult other people too.
I’ve muted countless numbers of people on Facebook for this reason. It’s best to leave them in their own echo chamber until it all blows over.
Just give it all a rest.
One of the greatest tackles the world of football has ever seen
How to survive it all with your sanity intact
First let’s remind ourselves what a blessing it is to live in a country where we have democracy. And relatively low levels of political corruption. For all the gripes, it could be so much worse.
And even as bad as it might get, whichever political party wins power, I can’t see that changing any time soon.
But that’s where you might want to stop counting your blessings.
Going back to where I started this article: the whole election race is quite frankly a waste of your time. I didn’t say it’s not important. It’s just that you don’t need to be involved in weeks of endless debates and energy-sapping TV shows and articles on the whole mess.
The way to survive this, I’m sorry to say, is to employ the same strategy that all of the politicians take: look out for yourself.
Spending hours of your time soaking up the guff that comes out of the mouths of the politicians and their media supporters probably isn’t going to change your mind much on how you’ll vote. You’ve probably got a fair idea of that already, and if not then you might as well just have a brief skim through their manifestos and pick the one that you think will do the least damage (this website helps you try to evaluate their policies in an unbiased way: https://voteforpolicies.org.uk/). That wont take very long, and you’ll have saved dozens of hours of watching TV and reading articles in which you’ll learn absolutely nothing.
Whilst it’s incredibly important to vote, you don’t have to earn that vote by allowing yourself to be subjected to the hours of timewasting that go on.
Personally, when I make a list of all of the important things in my life at the moment, this general election is not even in the top 5. For me it ranks well below (in no particular order): family, friends, my job, my side hustles, my health, sport. And so it shall remain.
This is how you want to be preparing for the election…
Not coming down from our mountain
As for The Money Mountain, we’ve barely had one political chat between the 3 of us since the election was announced. And it will probably stay that way.
Because, whoever comes out leading this fine country, the best we can all do for ourselves is to adapt to it and put ourselves in as good a position as we can.
And for us, that means making sure that we don’t take our eye of the ball on our money-making ventures. Particularly our matched betting, and getting our new business off the ground. Whether it’s Boris, Jeremy or anyone else, we’ll be needing that cash.
Let’s leave all the nonsense to the others and not lose focus on what really matters. Here’s hoping we eventually get leaders who will not do too much damage, and in the meantime let’s all hope we survive this election.
Good luck until it all blows over.
What do you think?
Am I naive in trying to pay this election very little attention? What’s your strategy for dealing with it? What are you predictions for the outcome?
Whatever you want to say, let’s hear it in the comments below! I’d love to hear some debate on this matter.