One of the reasons which many people had for voting to leave the EU was the Government. The EU Referendum was, in actuality, the UK Government Referendum
The result of austerity had hit people hard. Over the decade up to 2020, an additional 800,000 children are expected to be living in poverty — almost one in four British children. Over the same period, an extra 1.5 million working-age adults are expected to fall into poverty, bringing the total to 17.5 per cent from this group.
Although we have heard experts say ‘this country will go to the dogs if it leaves the EU’, what has not been said though, is that for many people in the UK it has already been rock bottom. As of May 2015, a third of Britain’s population was under the poverty line. Therefore, any sort of change, at all, was always going to be seen as a welcome one. The fact that Leave voters were more likely to be poorly educated people from the north of England, coming from some of Britain’s poorest areas, adds force to this argument.
Poverty is a very valid reason to hate the Government and to be angry, frustrated and upset with what it has, or more accurately, hasn’t done for you. However, I do not believe it was right for people to have changed the aim of the referendum. It was about whether Britain should remain in the European Union, not whether Cameron should continue as the current Prime Minister.
Making the referendum an anti-establishment vote did not change anything. The people at the bottom, are still at the bottom and will probably be pushed further down by the economic impact of leaving the EU. Yes, Cameron did leave, but he did not take any of his austerity policies with him. They stayed as firmly as they have been since 2010, defended by May since she came into power. This means that for the voters who voted against the EU because they were disengaged, disenfranchised and just angry at the Government, Brexit has so far proved to be a failure.
This brings me to America. If there was any way I could get a giant megaphone and yell one thing down it, it would be this:
A vote for Trump is not an anti-establishment vote! A vote for Trump is a vote for Trump.
Many people have said that they have/will vote fro Trump because he is new. He is not part of the ‘corrupt’ political world and he is against everything US politics stands for. We know this isn’t true. He is lying and being manipulative, just as Clinton has shown to be. And Trump isn’t even doing it to fund his campaign! Even if he was against everything US politics stands for, it is clear that Trump is not the man to revamp politics, but just take it to the dogs — much as we’re seeing now with the Brexit vote.
If the Brexit vote has taught us anything, it is that voting for the ‘new’ or the ‘different’ is not really an anti-establishment stance. It doesn’t solve anything. It doesn’t solve the issue of corruption, of the political elite, of the poor getting ignored or of the electorate getting lied to … again.
If you want to vote for Trump because you believe in his policies, his ideologies and his party then vote for him. If you don’t, then don’t vote for him. But if you actually want to vote against ‘the system’ then go ahead and spoil your vote. This is where one can deliberately ruin their ballot paper to publically show they have essentially voted for ‘none of the above’. It is the perfect way to ‘not vote’ without looking politically apathetic. Another way to show your disinterest is to vote for a joke candidate. For example, in the US you can vote for Mickey Mouse. Such ways allow you in some small measure to vote for what you actually want: a real, true, honest vote against the system.
