Last night your editor went to dinner at the Olio Cucino restaurant in Melbourne. We heard John Hirst talk about ‘Why Australia should abolish compulsory voting’.
We listened with interest. And we agreed that voting shouldn’t be compulsory…but we thought that anyway.
What was more interesting was the history of latent violence by the State against Australian citizens. How the State used police to ensure people enrolled for elections.
And how the government employed ‘spies’ — postmen and the police — to inform on Aussies if they failed to re-enrol to vote after moving house.
According to Hirst, the passive Aussie attitude to State violence comes from the lack of civil unrest in Australian history. People have grown to trust government and authority rather than question it.
As Hirst said, for a country that has a cop-shooting petty criminal as a national icon (Ned Kelly), it’s surprising how compliant people are in obeying authority.
But after all the debate about the pros and cons of compulsory voting, we asked Hirst a simple question:
‘Considering the abuses of the State in compulsory voting and non-compulsory voting nations, and the abuses of authoritarian States, isn’t the issue that government is the problem, rather than the voting mechanism?’
Hirst didn’t agree. But we are right. Regardless of the form, the State is a violent body. It steals from those it hates (the people) and gives to those it adores (employees and contractors of the State).
Cheers,
Kris.
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