CHARISMA'S PLACE IN POLITICS?
How important do you think charisma is in politics? More to the point, how important should it be?
The next election is rapidly becoming a battle of personalities. Drab and world weary Brown vs Flash (if slightly slimy) Cameron. Oh, and of course Clegg bobs around trying to get the attention he ought to deserve as head of a party whilst remaining tragically forgettable. What has happened is that through our loathing or loving of individuals we have forgotten to focus on policies.
We are being slowly blinded by British politics' somewhat awkward attempts to drum up American scale election enthusiasm.
An example of focus on the individuals is NIck Griffin and the BNP. Media and the rest of us all tend to focus on what a racist nasty carachter Griffin is without focusing on the real issue: the BNP are becoming increasingly popular, have 2 MEP seats and are trickling racism and extreme right wing ideals through our society. There are doctors, teachers, police men, people in positions of authority harbouring these ideals. This is dangerous but all we focus on is how close together Griffin's eyes are!
So should we stop caring so much about Samantha Cameron's pregnancy or Gordon Brown's weird smile and start focusing on the real issues? What would life reallye under a Tory/ Labour/ Liberal/ UKIP/ BNP government?
THANK YOU
Please respond,
Eve
Views: 16
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Z. Aym on -
First off, brilliant to see this started :D
"How important do you think charisma is in politics? More to the point, how important should it be?"
Personally, not greatly important as it is one of many factors. On a wider level, I suppose the age we live in demands that politicians be [likeable] personalities even more than they are capable politicians. As we've become better connected and have information on anything readily available, charisma plays a more determining role because people like someone is who personable, like JFK or Churchill. Or so the theory goes. How important should it be? It shouldn't be the winning factor - politics is a game, so I'd like to have someone who can play the game damn well while staying true to the policies/promises/principles that got them elected. The best person for the job necessarily isn’t the most charismatic. I honestly cannot see the fuss about SamCam- yes, he got her pregnant, what is so special or election-worthy of that?
Aye, British politics is painfully trying to become more like American politics. The theatricality of politics across the pond is what sparks the enthusiasm – elections become like a hit shows: the politicians are the actors, the parties are the TV networks, the electorate are the spectators. Chances are with this approach a higher percentage of the electorate are engaged. Engagement Is what British politicians want, but their current attempts are laughable. SamCam, the ‘secret weapon’ and babyCam – seriously? Is this is shamefaced attempt at garnering support from tabloid readers? And those ridiculous Change posters with Cameron’s face giving a sickly, yet thoroughly unconvincing concerned expression (and the fantastic website created as a consequence :D)
The rise of the BNP highlights other more pressing concerns. Quite a few of their supporters claim they’re not racist or extreme in their views, yet they support the party. I agree with you about the media – they’ve all taken the position of ridiculing the BNP and automatically discrediting them. However, their opinions should be voiced objectively because ‘they’ll give themselves enough rope to hang themselves’. Their policies need to be openly debated and challenged in the same way that other parties’ policies are. If they want to be taken seriously, they should stop banning the press from their meetings because they don’t agree with things that were written about them. I thought the instance where they kicked out that Times reporter from a meeting did them more harm than any damning indictment published in a newspaper did: it showed you just how little they respected the freedom of the press/expression and the lengths they’d go to censure opinions that disagreed with their own.
Life under the Tories: a hellish nightmare. If SamCam was his secret weapon to secure him the election... Change for Cameron is not change for the public, but for himself. I’d place this right above the BNP government choice.
Life under Labour: unpredictable. Can go either way considering the party needs to regenerate if it wants to keep its supporters.
Life under Lib Dems: hopeful. They have the policies, they have good politicians, contrary to popular belief Nick Clegg can be an inspirational orator. I think they could do this country a lot of good.
Life under the BNP: ends. There will be no life left on this island – the intelligent people will have left, the ethnic minorities/immigrants/LGBT community/anyone else they hate will have also have left or been deported, the remaining people would have died from starvation due to poor management of crucial resources and the start of WW3 (the nuclear war that killed half the world). So... I exaggerate, a bit. But the BNP screams Nazis to me and I’d like to heed history’s warnings to mankind.
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Permalink Reply by April Williamson on -
NOOO! ok I basically jsut wrote an essay on this and youtube made my tabs all close before I could publish :'( ok I will try and re-wrtie this *sob*
First, totalyl agree with Aym, this is brilliant discussion :) !
All of the conversations that I have had with friends and family about politics recently have always boiled down to the most important factor of today's politics being so ludicrously based around what are basically personality cults. I find it mildly depressing to think that the public (which sadly includes us...) is so ridiculously susceptible to this personality-obsessive version of politics. In looking at US politics, the UK should not follow its example if I may say so. Thinking about how we are beginning to treat politics, I can't help but think of that video on YouTube where people are being interviewed about Sarah Palin outside her booksigning in Ohio, everybody is oh so quick to say how much they love Sarah Palin, and how her policies if she was president owuld fix the "mess the country was in," but once asked about what her policies actually were not one person could coem up with a good answer, The best that anyone could come up with ater looking like they had been caught out was a vague, "she would clean up the governments tax spending."
In looking at all of the Politics sections of online newspapers, it is actually infuriating. Literally, I feel like every time I try to find out what is going on that I am completely lef tin the dark about anything even vaguely important, it's like 9/10 of the articles are about politicos b****ing eachother out, for a lack of a better description, and MAYBE if you are really lucky 1/10 articles about new policies and things which are actually relevant to the upcoming election.
I find it really sad that politics has been reduced to this mess of people trying to faun about for the publics attention, goverments have also become far too centralised. Literally, parties are becoming harder and harder to differentiate from eachother. Parties have become so caught up in gaining public approval that they have totally stopped trying to be inventive or innovative in their policies; parties have become so obsessed with their percentages in the public polls that parties cannot change any of their policies in fear that the other parties may get some leverage over them, its like some sort of endless "prisonner's dilema". I'm not saying that I would want extreme policies, but this light-footed personality obsessed politics is just infuriating and even somewhat patronising. Change needs to be made, I think, and nothing is going to be done while politics is mucking around with personal popularity, we need to be more foccused on what is BEST for the UK, not what would be best for any one party to become the most popular. Literally, sometimes i feel like I'm talking about some kind of popularity contest in a highschool, is this what we have been reduced to??
But if parties are so unwilling to change in case they lose their popularity, how can they change? With parties becomeing so centalised, many people are not being represented. I frankly find it terrible that people find themselves better represented by parties such as the BNP, parties need to start thinking more about what needs to be done for the country, not what needs to be done to keep them on top.
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Permalink Reply by April Williamson on
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ps, sorry about any type-o's, that was a super fast re-type and my keyboard is kinda iffy! Also, if you guys havent seen the youtube vid I was talking about just type in "Sarah Palin book signing interviews" into youtube, I was going to link you but appearently my laptop doesn't like youtube :'( ! It's quite funny though if you are interested :) xx
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Permalink Reply by April Williamson on
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pps
Z. you forgot to tell us your prediction on what would happen if Green won :) !! Are you seriously telling me that BNP has a better chance than Green? That is just depressing!
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Permalink Reply by Z. Aym on
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Haha, I'd hope not! That'd be utterly dismal. I left out a few because I was being dragged off the 'puter.
Life under the Greens: The future's not orange, but greener :P I can't envisage anything going terribly wrong with their policies and they'd actually directly confront the Climate Change issue. Also, no uni tuition fees? Shame they're not in government now.
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Permalink Reply by Einy Shah on -
I totally agree with you that there is going to be more this election campaign than solid policy - character and personality will play a huge role. However, what I am finding on the doorstep is that people do want to know what David Cameron, in a personal capacity, really stands for. We know Tony Blair and Gordon Brown - for 13 long, dreary years, a sense attachment has grown. And we know that Brown isn't the best performer, a wooden bench probably has more personality than he does - but at least we know what we're getting.
I think this country needs a charismatic, young, energetic Prime Minister - and I know David Cameron fits the bill.
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Permalink Reply by April Williamson on
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Hahaha I see even here you are spreading the conservative propaganda! ;) How have you been since the last editorial meeting?? xx
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Permalink Reply by Einy Shah on
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Blimey, seems like an age since we last met! I've been good, depressingly busy because of the election - I'm getting home at around 10pm :(
How about yourself?
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Permalink Reply by Eve1994 on -
Oh no I'm not suggesting people have no idea as to policies etc but just that (even with that understanding) they are being overlooked. Most ordinary (and some truly extraordinary) people know the basic diferences between parties and policies but probably have much clearer opinions on which leaders they prefer.
And why do we need a "charasmatic young
energetic leader" what real tangeable good will that do the average Britin?
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Permalink Reply by Einy Shah on
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I'm not too sure people do have a clear dividing line between policies. It's been argued (mainly by the Lib Dems) that the two major parties have too much in common and not enough that differentiates them - I wholly disagree of course. I am pretty tired of Labour's bureaucracy, their nanny state, the idea that a tax on a growing problem (dangerous dogs) will solve the world ills etc
If you look at last months budget - Darling's mundane tone and lack of personality turned ordinary people off, I know various MPs, including those on Labour benches that dozed off. I myself could not stay conscience. However, look at the way David Cameron resurrected the budget, his energetic response gave the budget character, it made it easier to understand because we could see that he was passionate and dedicated and he appealed to a lot more people - including the younger generation.
He was down with the kids.
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Permalink Reply by Eve1994 on
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Oh joy. Down wid da kids. We need MORE. We need substance and a sense of real change. Not just the word change plastered over posters.
I saw about 5 tory propoganda posters on one road today. 3 were simply attacking brown without providing any kind of argument why the Tory party would do any better. The others said "I've never voted Tory before but we need to mend our broken society..." HOW? What does that even mean?! Patronising people by promising them ambiguous things like change and mending does not make you a good leader.
And Darling's the chancellor not a spin merchant. He's there to do a job, I don't care if he's boring if he's doing his job well.
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Permalink Reply by Harry Naio on -
Charisma is becoming increasingly important, but is that because of Americas' influence or is it because there isn't anything else to look at?
The politics of today are becoming increasingly vacuous and all the parties have moved to the centre-right apart from possibly the lib-dems. given that there is such little difference between the different parties, people are going to increasingly strange lengths to find a distinction. This results in character politk rather than a policy based analysis, more for lack of policy than americanisation, though both are definitely contributing factors.
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