Friday, April 15, 2005

OK, maybe I am a bit left wing

I've just taken the Political Survey 2005 (via perfect.co.uk who are collecting everyone's results here).

Here are my results

This is the second test I've taken recently and it seems that I am a bit left wing. This isn't really a surprise to me but it doesn't really sit very well with the wee bit about me in the sidebar. I'm about to change it but, for the record, right now it says:
Mr Bush and Mr Blair made me like this. I certainly don't think I'm left wing. I guess I've always been somewhere in between. I really am curious but I'm not really a hamster. I'm Garry.

Before I change it I'm going to try to explain why it said that in the first place.

I'm 33 years old and I can still remember the Thatcher years. When I turned 18 I refused to pay the poll tax but it was abolished not long after. In those days Labour was left wing and I was a Liberal Democrat voter and firmly in the centre. I've always wanted PR, something I put down to a very good Modern Studies teacher at Torry Academy who's name I sadly can't remember. I've always though that Thatcherism put to much emphasis on economic growth and not enough on social justice. I'd heard the stories about how bad the previous Labour government had been, in particular the "winter of discontent", and it seemed to me that there ought to be a middle way. As I learned a bit more about how elections work in the UK I became even more committed to the idea of PR. So many votes are meaningless under FPTP. The "big two"must appeal to a narrow group of swing voters and to hell with the rest of us.

Now that I've started to take a more active interest in political issues again, my views are largely unchanged but the political landscape is very different. New Labour is not a left wing party, despite Robin Cook's protestations. These days, my opinions are mostly to the left of New Labour. I'm certainly not a radical left winger but I think there should be a greater concern for fairness and less concern for money and consumerism. I believe that unchecked consumerism is an unhealthy state of mind; when did you last meet someone who thought they had "enough?"

So, I'm going to change the description above, not because I feel I have moved to the left, (not much anyway) but because the political debate has moved so far to the right. I now consider myself to be slightly left wing. What I'd like is for political debate to be moved back towards the left so that I can change it back. I like being in the centre, no-one notices you there.

Unrelated but:
I might well play around with my template later. It could be a complete redesign because I just love to mess about with stuff. If I find something I like, I promise not to change it ever again (or for at least a couple of month anyway). It's against my better judgement but I'll probably put my last name in the "about me" bit as well. In for a penny...

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