Our democracy is doomed!
For all the gory details of its demise, check out this column
by the Toronto Star’s Chantal Hebert.
She explains how the Conservative government, in its “Fair
Elections Act”, plans to – are you ready for this? -- forbid Elections Canada
from launching “outreach campaigns”.
Imagine that! No more Elections Canada outreach campaigns!!
It’s outrageous! It’s scary! It’s Orwellian! (Note: George
Orwell was a noted political writer who penned the classic anti-totalitarian novel
about a wild college fraternity called Animal Farm House.)
If this news doesn't terrify you, it must be because you don't know Elections Canada’s outreach campaign is
a campaign whereby Elections Canada tries to “reach” “out” and motivate people
to vote.
This is similar to other government motivational campaigns such
as its stop smoking campaign, its stop taking drugs campaign, its do more exercise
campaign, its recycle your garbage campaign, and its pay more attention to
government motivational ad campaigns campaign.
Technically, such government campaigning is known as “nagging.”
At any rate, an important part of that Elections Canada “outreach”
campaign is its effort to convince young people that voting is cool and hip.
Now you might be thinking there’s no way middle-aged
Elections Canada bureaucrats, whose idea of fun is coming up with “spoiled”
ballot jokes, could ever be “groovy” enough to effectively reach out to today’s
youth.
Well, if you watch this youth “outreach”
ad you’ll see exactly how much Elections Canada is “with it.”
Yes, sir, with this ad airing on
TV, it’s no wonder young people vote by the dozens.
Although admittedly some studies
suggest that when young people are exposed to these hip Elections Canada ads, many
of them not only don’t vote, they actually renounce the very concept of
democracy.
But whether or not these ads work really isn’t the point.
The point is without the government telling them what to do at
election time, an entire generation of young Canadians will lapse into an X-Box
induced apathetic coma.
That means only non-cool old people will vote!
But wait, there’s more bad news.
As we all know, if young people don’t vote in large enough
numbers, Liberal leader Justin Trudeau might (gasp) lose the next election.
And Hebert fears despite his Teenbeat model looks, despite his
promise to legalize marijuana, despite his idealistic persona and despite his
party’s sophisticated GOTV measures, without Election Canada ads to energize
apathetic young people, Trudeau won’t be
able mobilize his Liberal Youth Legions.
In other words, stopping Elections Canada from advertising
to help Trudeau probably violates the British North America Act, because surely
the Fathers of Confederation never meant for us to have non-Liberal government!
So what can we do to protect our democratic values from this
vicious assault?
Well, there’s only one thing we can do: wait for guidance
from a hip and cool government ad.
