Decisions Are Made By Those Who Show Up: Why Voting and Calling Congress Isn't a Waste of Time

When I first wrote this piece about a year ago, I wrote it specifically to encourage people to call or email their Congresspeople or other elected representatives. But it applies just as well to voting. So I'm recycling it here today. I'm concerned that progressives in the U.S. may not turn out very heavily in tomorrow's election, since a lot of progressives are very disillusioned with politics and government right now... and since and there's not an exciting, charismatic, history- changing candidate running for President. I don't care. Vote anyway. This piece talks about why. Just replace "calling Congress" with "voting."

*

Okay. The title is a bit off. A more accurate title would be, "Why Calling Or Emailing Congress, The President, And Your Other Elected Officials Not Only Isn't A Waste Of Time, But Is One Of The Most Important Things We Can Do To Take Back Our Supposedly Democratically Elected Government." But the Writer's Union would have my head if I went with a title like that...

I'm writing today to ask you to write and/or email your Senator, your Congressperson, your President. Your governor. Your mayor. Your city council. Your school board. If you don't live in the U.S.: Your Prime Minister, your Premiere, your MP, your Assemblymember, your Deputy, whatever.

Not on any particular issue. Just in general. On whatever issue you care about.

And I want to argue that this is not a waste of time. I want to argue that this is one of the single most effective political actions we can take: not just to change this policy or that policy, but to change the entire way our government works, and the amount of power we have in it.

When I wrote my recent piece exhorting readers to call/ email Congress and the President about the public option for health care, many of you followed through, with a heartening degree of enthusiasm. But a surprising number of politically aware, politically astute people were strongly resistant: not to the public option for health care, but to the very idea of contacting their elected officials at all. They thought their voices wouldn't be heard or cared about. They thought it was a waste of time.

I want to persuade you that it is not a waste of time.

And I want to persuade myself as well. I don't call or email my representatives nearly as much as I think I should, and I'm writing this partly to remind myself to do it more.

Here is my thesis.

*

The fact that Americans feel so alienated from our government? The fact that so many people don't vote? The fact that most people don't call or email the President or their Congresspeople to tell them how they feel about important issues? The fact that so many people think politicians don't care about them anyway, so there's no reason they should bother getting involved?

This plays directly into the hands of the very people we don't want running the show.

This is one of the main reasons government is so much more responsive to hard-line extremists and big-money corporate interests than it is to the majority of people it's representing.

This is one of the main reasons government is so screwed up.

When very few people get involved in politics -- when very few people even bother to vote, and even fewer bother to call or email their elected representatives -- then the few people who do bother are the ones who get listened to. The hard-line crazies get to set the terms of the debate. Them, and the people with money.

Why do you think the extreme religious right was so successful, for so long, in setting this country's political agenda? They were successful, in large part, because they had an extraordinarily well-oiled machine of millions of inspired people who would make phone calls and write letters at the drop of a hat. When the folks on the mailing lists of the religious right got a call for action telling them to call or write their Congressperson, they didn't lapse into cynicism about how no politician really cares about them… and they didn't lapse into soul-searching about whether they were sufficiently educated on this issue to express their opinion. They bloody well picked up the phone and called.

Decisions are made by those who show up.

And if we want to be making the decisions, we have to show up.

There's a larger, more systemic way that this plays out, too. The fact that people feel jaded and alienated by politics and government? It's a textbook example of a vicious circle. The less that people get involved in their government, the less politicians have to worry about the voters… and the more they can suck up to big money contributors. And the more that politicians suck up to big money contributors, the more alienated and jaded people get about government... and the less likely they are to get involved.

This circle isn't going to get broken by elected officials. And it sure as hell isn't going to get broken by corporate interests. The only way it's going to get broken is by citizens picking up their phones or getting on their computers and telling their elected officials, "If you want my vote ever again, you freaking well better vote for X." And then Y. And then Z. Over, and over, and over again. The only people who can break this circle are you and me.

Not getting involved doesn't make government better. It makes government worse. It plays right into the hands of the corporate intererests, who find it easier to get laws written their way when there aren't all those pesky citizens to worry about.

And it plays right into the right-wing "keep government small and taxes low" rhetoric -- otherwise translated as, "Keep taxes on rich people and big corporations low; keep regulations on business to a bare minimum if that; and keep government services for poor and middle- class people stripped to the bone." People's cynicism about government, their belief that it never helps them and doesn't have anything to do with them unless it's screwing them over, and it's always better to have it small and weak since it sucks so badly? That's one of the strongest cards in the right wing's hand.

I've written about this before, and I'll write it again: Government is -- in theory, and at least some of the time in practice -- the way a society pools some of its resources, to provide itself with structures and services that make that society function smoothly and that promote the common good. And it's the way a society decides how those pooled resources should be used. It's one of the main ways that a society shares, cooperates, works together, takes care of each other -- all those great ideals we learned in kindergarten. Government is roads, parks, fire departments, street sweepers, public health educators, emergency services, sewers, schools. Government is not Them. Government -- democratic government, anyway -- is Us.

But for government to do all this and be all this, not just in theory but in practice, we need to start seeing government as Us.

And calling/ emailing your President, your Senators, your Congressperson, your governor and your mayor and your dogcatcher, is one of the most powerful things we can do to turn government from Them into Us. It reminds our elected officials that they work for Us, that they're there to represent Us. And maybe just as importantly, it reminds us of that, too.

If you want to look at it idealistically: Many elected officials get into politics because they want to make a difference, and want to represent the will of their voters. And those officials are desperately wishing for citizens to kick up a stink on important issues: it makes it easier for them to fight special interests, and it lets them know that we've got their back. (It's a whole lot easier to tell your big campaign contributors, "No," when you can say, "I'm really sorry, but my phone is ringing off the hook about this one, and if I don't support/ oppose it my voters will have my head.")

But you can also see this in a completely venal, Machiavellian view... and still come to the same conclusion. Squeaky wheels. Grease. Many elected officials don't much care about making a difference... but they bloody well care about getting re-elected. Politicians assume that if people care enough about an issue to call or write about it, they'll care enough to vote the bums out on election day. If enough people call or write, it can override the voice of big- money special interests… even for the most self-serving politician in the world.

So that's the general principle. Participatory democracy. You know, the principle that this country fought a revolution for.

And yet a lot of people who agree with the principle still don't follow through in practice. A lot of people who passionately support the idea of participatory democracy still don't pick up the phone or get on the computer to, you know, participate in it. (Including me a lot of the time.)

Why is that?

I posted this question on Facebook the other day. I asked, "If someone asks you to email your Congressperson, and you don't, even if you care about the issue -- what stops you?"

I wasn't asking to judge or criticize. Hell, I do this, too. I decide that I'm too tired, too busy, that if I responded to every "Call your Congressperson" email I got I'd never get anything else done. But it does bug me. It's such a simple thing to do, and it can make such a huge difference, and I'm trying to figure out what, specifically, keeps us from doing it.

So now -- again, for my own benefit as much as anybody else's -- I want to respond to some of the answers I got to this question. I want to remind myself, and anyone else reading this, that the reasons for not calling or emailing your elected officials, as understandable as they may be, simply aren't anywhere near as compelling as the reasons for calling and emailing.

(Here's Part 2 of the original.) Again, it talks more about calling elected officials than it does about voting... but I think it's still relevant.

Comments

[Valhar2000]

Do you get a lot of e-mails asking you to call or write a representative that are not sent to you by conservative organizations of family members?

I've never seen anything like that; it seems to me that this practice of sending out alerts that call for action is far more common among the Right than it is among the Sane.

[TechSkeptic]

interesting... is there an opportunity here?

Would you pay a few cents extra if the process of writing a real letter (not an email) were made easier?

Is there already a site that does this? Lets you write an enelectronic letter and they send out the actual letter.

I know this is lame, but the biggest part that stops me from writing a letter, is the printing, envelope stuffing, finding a dog forsaken stamp, and taking to the mail box.

[llewelly]

OT: I would like to know what you think of how Monica Shores (Ms. Magazine blogger) framed your view of Gnu Atheism's handling of gender issues, in this article.
Jen and PZ have already written about this.

[Greta Christina]

llewelly: Jen summed up perfectly exactly what I would say about it, and more. I am, with Jen, appalled that they would frame me as a "progressive blogger," without bothering to mention that I am a freaking FEMALE ATHEIST BLOGGER, and one who is (if I can be immodest for a moment) very widely read and well respected in the atheist blogosphere. Plus there's the fact that they neglected to mention my name. There is, as Jen pointed out, a terrifically stupid irony in the fact that Ms. Magazine is grinding an axe about how female leaders in the atheist movement aren't sufficiently recognized... without bother to actually, you know, recognize us. (Again -- as Jen said. Her piece really does say it better than I could.)

But then, I can't say I'm surprised. I have been underwhelmed by Ms. Magazine for a very, very long time now.

[llewelly]

Thank you.