The Martlet

Youth voters are scary

ryan haak

More than 2.1 million 18- to 24-year-olds are unhappy. Harper has been throwing us out of election campaign rallies and trying to get Elections Canada to quash our votes. He’s avoiding us and hoping we’ll stay away from the ballot box. We’re finally paying attention, and that damages his lustful campaign for lordship over our country.

We feel bad for Harper — he’s afraid of us.

We feel bad for his supporters, who can do nothing but bellow frantically about the evils of people working together. They’re afraid of debating women. They’re afraid we’re all on drugs. They’re afraid of us, period. That’s why they want to build prisons. That’s why they need fighter jets to fight wars.

They’re all about the economy. It’s economy this, economy that — it all comes back to stable economic consumption levels. Apparently they need more, not better. This is their economy. This is not our economy.

Our economy would be greener, more compassionate and more prudent about everyone’s long-term well-being. Our economy would be healthier and more egalitarian. They’re afraid of this. It takes away all their reckless fun. Invest in our education? No, they’d rather invest in Syncrude and Shell. Their economy hurts more than it helps.

It’s not just about making sure we can educate ourselves without mountains of debt. It’s not just about ensuring that public and environmental debts don’t spiral out of control. The Conservatives are leaving the bill for their party to us, and we’ve had enough. We’re spreading the word that our government is afoul, and like our peers around the world, we’re going to do something unprecedented about it.

The youth vote has the ability to significantly alter the outcome of this election. So Harper and Co. should be afraid. We’re going to form a mob that marches into those voting booths to elect parties that care about us more than they care about absolute power. It can start right here before you go home. We can flood Elections Canada with demands to put polls back on campuses. Harper and his gang bullied them into taking away our ability to vote where it makes most sense for us. While we’re at it, we can download and request mail-in ballots so that we can have our say.

We’re taking our Canada in another direction. Conservatives should be afraid of our votes because they’re going to lose control. We’re not going to let our government walk away from us any longer. We won’t let it get away with whatever it pleases.

There are a few things we can do to get rid of Harper and his band of Tory goons. The first is obvious: if you have the time and energy, get involved and spread the word.

The second one is a little thing called ABC (Anything But Conservative) voting — also known as strategic voting. It’s really simple. Just vote for the person most likely to beat the Conservative candidate in your riding, especially if you live in a swing riding.

We know it sucks to vote Liberal as an NDP voter or vice versa, but if your candidate doesn’t have a hope in hell of winning anyway, do the country a solid and at least help boot out the Conservatives.

There are many resources to help you identify which candidate is most likely to trump a Tory, such as projectdemocracy.org. Check it out, get informed, and vote against your local Conservative. Because voting for your second or third choice is better than a Conservative majority.

Please. We’re begging you. Because however afraid Harper is of us, we’re terrified by the thought of his nutty bunch forming government once again.