To the editor,
Re: Bring hopes – and votes to election day in B.C., Editorial, Oct. 16.
Less than two hours before the polls close on this election day I already know who will win. It is called ‘fear.’ The Conservatives rose in popularity in large part by promoting fear that the NDP would make B.C. much ‘worse.’ The NDP campaigned on being the only alternative to how the Conservatives will ‘destroy’ the province, even in safe NDP ridings such as Nanaimo-Gabriola. Out of this fear many people held their noses and voted for one of those two parties, or else stayed at home. Which means that democracy lost. Even this newspaper did not discourage people from voting ‘strategically.’
Democracy was already damaged when B.C. United capitulated to the growing Conservatives, again in order to ‘stop the NDP.’
All of this would have been prevented had B.C. adopted proportional representation so that everyone’s votes would have counted and elected who we really wanted in power. Even the vote for this option was thwarted, in part, because of the fears promoted by those opposed to a strengthened democracy,
one that is embraced in most democratic nations.
Without a better way of voting, what of democracy, the belief that together we can work together and create better outcomes for all of us and our planetary home? Fear will not bring it back. Only hope, compassion, courage, and an understanding that without a robust democracy we all lose.
Ian Gartshore, Nanaimo
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