tl;dr — don’t read this. It is an exercise in self help and to try and help me understand my options and my head space. It has little practical benefit to anyone other than me! I’m still going to publish it though :)
Some days politics makes you want to scream and rage. Other days it makes you want to cry. The announcement yesterday by May and the warm embrace of the announcement by Corbyn has led to me being incredibly depressed (and to react in both ways)!
About me first: I’m 41, I’ve voted in every election I’ve been entitled to vote in since I was old enough to vote. I’m a member of the Labour Party. The incompetence of Corbyn’s leadership of the Party has made me furiously angry. I didn’t vote for Corbyn and I don’t support him. The fact that vulnerable people are dying in this country because of his incompetence makes me feel sick. For the first time ever I am completely at a loss about how I will vote come June.
A bit about the constituency I live in: Twickenham is I guess a marginal seat, certainly a LibDem target seat. It is a seat that was held by Cable (LD) for a long time, before him Jessel for the Tories. In 2015, it followed the national trend and Cable lost to Matthias following a strong ‘get the vote out’ Tory campaign and in supporters of other parties opting to vote for their party and not tactically. Labour and the other parties aren’t players; it’s a straight 2-way fight.
My options:
- Don’t vote. I realised this morning that this was actually an option for me. I NEVER expected this to happen and its shocked me.
- Spoil my ballot — or ‘a pox on all your houses’ option. At least I’ll have gone to the ballot box and my vote will be counted, even if it is disgarded.
- Vote Labour. I’ve voted for my Party in every election bar the 2010 GE when I voted tactically for Cable. I’m not sure I can vote for Labour at present; I don’t support Corbyn, the party is in chaos and split and it would basically be as pointless as the first two options in this constituency.
- Vote tactically. This is code for vote LibDem. I don’t think I can do this. The last experience I have of this was that when I decided to vote tactically the LibDems went into coalition with the Tories. I am hugely anti-Tory and this burned me badly. The pain is still raw and hurts (I know, silly isn’t it?).
There we are. In black and white. These are my options. And they all stink. I’m going to have to think hard and try to somehow not spend each day between now and the next election waking up and wanting to just crawl away and nurse my pain.
