Uponnothing.co.uk

During the last election Tony Blair - thanks to the ‘first past the post’ electoral system - secured 55% of the seats in parliament, a majority reduced from 161 seats to 67. New Labour achieved this with the lowest share of the vote in modern times, holding only 35% of the vote, with the Conservatives holding 32%, and the Liberal Democrats 22%. Therefore considering that only around 61% of the electorate voted, New Labour’s victorious 35% share of the vote equates to only around 22% of the total electorate. In the 2001 election around 50% of young people under 25 in the UK voted, yet 10 million people, mostly under 25, managed to vote in the Big Brother reality TV show. How has voting for people in ‘reality’ TV programs become more pressing than the election of our governments?

When you look at Big Brother it is classed as ‘reality’ TV as it deals with ‘real’ people, put in ‘real’ situations, reacting naturally with complete exposure to the public. With Big Brother people have their voyeurism rewarded with a kind of truth, they have access to the people on screen for 24 hours a day, and can view their every action and hear their every word. When people have this access they are able to untangle the motives behind the people in the show, and are even spoon-fed such information by psychologists who frequent the show, analysing what the actions and interactions mean. Through personal perception, and professional analysis, viewers are able to make an informed choice as to whom they want to win, and because they have done so, they will vote in support of that person.

Politics has similarities, but with crucial differences. With politics we have the same kind of interaction - albeit perhaps reduced to election campaigns - where politicians will try and convince viewers that they are the ones to vote for. Like Big Brother analysis of politicians will be made, motives examined (ironically not usually in as much detail as the house mates are), and people will be asked to vote for whom they believe in (or believe full stop). Politicians and contestants alike are out to win; they each form alliances, produce manifestos, and generally try to convince the public to like them. However, politicians will never become accountable in the way that Big Brother contestants are.

Politicians offer nothing more than front, the public have become unconvinced by spin, lies, propaganda, PR, and personal assaults on opposition campaigners - all the things employed by politicians during election campaigns. What the public want is to know who is lying, what people really mean, what the truth is behind that public front - who is worthy of their vote? Big Brother gives them this, it gives them unparalleled access to the reality of those they vote for, the contestants are accountable to the public, and can be caught out on live TV by the public. This interaction makes voting on Big Brother a more powerful experience than voting in an election, and a more pressing issue for the public in many cases. To be motivated to do something people have to believe in it, they have to be sure of what they are voting for. In politics the public know that they are voting for whoever has hired the best PR company, or the person who has lied the most convincingly. More importantly they are aware that the reality of whom they have actually voted for will only become apparent once the time to vote has past - as it has with phoney Tony. The truth will eventually out, but they are powerless until the next round of PR begins at the start of the next election - four years after they cast the initial vote. This is the perfect recipe for apathy.

Big Brother motivates people because they can view the spin and the reality simultaneously - and in many ways subconsciously - and are empowered by the experience of knowing the truth. Even politicians on TV for 24 hours a day would slip-up, especially when dealing with the isolated sensation within the house and the provision of alcohol. Imagine if Tony Blair was on TV 24 hours a day, the public would be in no doubt then what the truth is behind the war in Iraq, and there would have been a lot more people voting during the last election if that was the case. So in order to get people politically motivated again requires accountability from the government, in England the government are barely held to account on any matter. To be a politician is to purposely avoid answering any direct question, how can this be allowed to happen? It is now blindingly obvious that Tony Blair lied consistently over Iraq, yet he has denied it completely ever since, he knows he is lying, and we know he is lying, and it is a damning indictment of British society that the prime minister is unaccountable to truth and the word of law. He lies, but it is of no consequence, other than mild embarrassment.

If anyone else was in the same situation then they would be in court and prosecuted, they would not be able to simply deny the accusations and make those lies truth merely by their utterance. How can anyone in this country possibly take any word of British law seriously when the prime minister of the country can break any laws he wishes, be discovered, yet still deny the truth? It is an insult to everybody who has to live in the UK and abide by the rule of law set down by the government - particularly when you consider the new anti-terror laws rushed through by Tony Blair. How can we abide by rules set out by a collection of frauds acting outside of the law? Or more importantly why should we?

If I commit murder I would be facing life imprisonment, if a prime minister commits mass murder he faces re-election and a lifetime of after dinner speeches and titles. Tony Blair is the epitome of hypocrisy, a murderer so mentally disillusioned that he thinks his actions are actually saving life, and saving humanity. His very existence makes a mockery of any idea that we live in a country of law, or moral values; it makes a mockery of any lingering hope that we actually live in a democracy. It is an insult that this ignorant, corrupt, power-hungry fraud can stand in public and lie repeatedly to his electorate, and will never face a jury simply because he is a politician.

It is Tony Blair’s biggest worry that he will not be remembered in the history books of the future; what he does not seem to realise is that eventually history only records facts, not propaganda, and he will be remembered as Britain’s Mussolini; a murdering fraud who believed his own propaganda, when everyone else knew it to be false.