Now and again I will write an
opinion piece on my blog about something that I feel strongly about. Most recently it was my yearly post that I
write about the Grand National.
My aim was to create a bit more
awareness regarding the number of horses that die as a result of horse racing. I wanted to dissuade people from betting but
as with everything, you can only present the facts and let people make up their
own minds.
When I published my Grand
National post this year I received a comment on Twitter asking why I bothered
even writing it, as most would never read it and even less would change their
minds. My response was that I would
rather speak up and put my opinion forward rather than keep silent. Silence accomplishes nothing.
I know that mine is only a tiny
voice, speaking out amidst a sea of other voices and opinions, but I would
always rather say what I think than keep quiet.
Did I change anyone’s mind this year about horseracing? I don’t know, but I’m still glad I wrote it.
So here I am today, with another
opinion.
UKIP. When I see a party like UKIP, I truly get
scared for the country. You do not have
to be a political genius to see that voting for them would send the country
down a path going backwards in time and to places that are beyond our
imaginations.
One of the problems however is
that unlike the BNP and EDL who carry a thug mentality with them for which they
are infamous for, UKIP have that most dangerous of things, an outwardly nice
looking veneer. The head of their party
looks like Rupert the Bear.
Harmless. The man standing for
UKIP in my area is an ex local police constable. Trustworthy.
I’m not going to give you the
whys and wherefores about why you shouldn’t vote UKIP. It is each person’s decision to vote for whom
they choose. All I really want to say is
actually look into who you are voting for.
See what they stand for. What
their policies are.
I’m unfortunately from a place
where the BNP always won seats and carried favour with many (absolutely not
me). The problem was, just as is the
problem with people voting for UKIP now, is that people are seeing one
particular point that they agree with, usually about immigration, and voted
accordingly. They don’t look at the
bigger picture.
I was talking to someone recently
who had decided to vote UKIP. Their
reason was purely because of their immigration stance. When I mentioned other points that UKIP want
to bring in, such as scrapping maternity pay and introducing a flat tax system,
their face went blank. This is why
voting without research is dangerous.
Whilst people need to vote and
not simply give up on the system; they also need to think.