Today is election day. While it is only a mid term election, it seems that candidates have pulled out the stops on this one.
I love to vote. When I think of how many of the world’s citizens have no representation in the powers that govern them, I feel blessed to be a part of a system that allows me to express my feelings. The rights we have today are often hard fought, and progress comes fastest through the voting booth. Some years it feels that the candidate choices are poor. Sometimes, it feels that all politicians are probably corrupt anyway, so why bother. But I always vote. It is a right and a privilege that we often take for granted in this country. Besides, if you don’t participate, you can’t complain… and I love to complain.
Speaking of complaining, what I hate are elections. They seem so wasteful. First is the amount of money raised and spent is beyond belief. I hate political commercials. A candidate’s positive and negative points cannot be boiled down into 30 seconds, so instead it seems easier to sling a little mud. I fear that many voters make up their minds on important issues from these tiny bits of info presented in a skewed way. I would love to now what the carbon footprint of each of these ads is.
Then there is the amount of paper wasted. I voted weeks in advance by absentee, but as late as yesterday, I was receiving postcards and mailers for local candidates. While I know mine will be recycled, in my neighborhood, most will go right to landfill. They have been arriving every day for weeks, and I think next year I will just save them all and make some sort of art project out of all them.
Then there are yard signs. During the last presidential election we saw a shift in national government candidates away from paper goods, so there were less yard signs. What happened this year? Perhaps it is the increase in local candidates in this election, but there are tons of yard signs. Everywhere. While driving near CSU last night, I noticed a strip of land in the median that had a few dozen yard signs. Worse, there were only a couple of candidates between them. Did campaign workers have a surplus, as voters hated their candidates? Or did they think that the most effective way to get people to vote their way was to drum it into our heads by repetition? Do drivers think as they see them, well, the first 12 signs were not convincing, but that last one sure put me over the top? Where do all these yard signs go tomorrow? Most will end up in landfill, and the ones on public land may be ignored completely as they are blown into traffic or some forgotten corner of blackberry bushes. If you have yard signs, try and recycle what you can. You can find a local community garden or even the Community Greenhouse Partners and see if they can use the metal stands to fashion tomato stakes, and the paper might be recyclable.
While I am glad to see so many candidates move to online ads, I am getting tired of them there too. I yearn for years before the 2008 election, when my social media was free of political advertising. As more of my work tackles client’s social media campaigns and online marketing, I can appreciate this move to virtual space and the effectiveness of the reach. Unfortunately, while online ads do not use paper, they do have their own carbon footprint.
So while I love to vote, I will be glad to see the bunting come down and the election over. Although it will be only a few short months until elected officials start spending their time planning the 2012 campaign.
