Redefeat Bush



I attended a meeting of "Re-defeat Bush", at Café de la Paz last night. It's an organization whose activities include calling people in Oregon who are not registered to vote, to try to get them to register in time for the election. Somehow the organization obtained a list of single women between 20 and 45 living in the greater Portland area - in other words, a demographic likely to vote five-to-one against W. It was interesting calling a bunch of random people in Portland, and getting the kind of responses I usually give to people who call me at home (not especially nice ones..). But all the same, I would be very glad to get a call from someone who was willing to go out of their way to help me register to vote. Apathy sucks, doesn't it? You can have all the good intentions in the world, but - (this theme keeps coming up here, doesn't it) - in the end, you have to act. I too have felt the kind of apathy that says, "Sure, I should go vote, but.. meh. What are ya gonna do." And then the rationalization, confabulation, and other means of reducing cognitive dissonance set in. I think it's good to nudge people over that hump.
In 1984, the apathy of the proles assured Big Brother's domination forever. I don't think we're headed that way yet, but it doesn't hurt to stave it off a little...

UPDATE (1/17/05): And now (okay, 2 months ago) ReDefeat Bush has emailed me with the subject "Overturn the Stolen Election". Err, okay.. I suppose cognitive dissonance cuts both ways. I'm not sure about protesting Bush's inauguration either; 4 years ago it made sense, but now it's almost tantamount to protesting democracy itself. I would rather see protests every time a piece of news that shows how terrible this administration is reaches us; but who has the time to protest every day?

Posted: Wed - September 15, 2004 at 11:17 PM | | | |

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