My experience with politics over the past few months

So… the past several months within politics have been interesting to say the least. The entire world seems to have hit a boiling point and as a 19 year old (even as someone who studies politics and IR) I have found myself ever increasingly anxious and confused at the world around me. The economy seems to be in the bin, international politics is becoming increasingly tense and hostile; and even with a new government coming into power in the UK, optimism for change is at an all time low. I am going to go through my personal experiences and feelings, as well as those of the people around me to try and represent how politics appears to younger people today. This piece is something I am currently cobbling together off the top of my head. I have not planned what I am currently writing in any way so it could be dreadful, but I want it to feel real. 

First off I think it’s important to give some background on myself to make it easier to see things from my point of view. I am currently enjoying my summer in between first and second year of university, while not financially unstable by any means I have definitely felt some strain and struggle which has affected me at times throughout the past year of uni. This year’s election was the first one I have ever had the opportunity to vote in and while I have always tended to lean closer to the centre right, I voted Lib Dem as I could not support a conservative party that was as split as it is currently (although I do hold more sympathy for them than most), nor a Labour party that seemed less interested in promoting what they were going to do, but rather built a weak campaign based on the sole fact that “we won't be as bad as the conservatives” (which it was then praised for). I know I don’t have all the answers so please if I end up anywhere in the future don’t quote this as my political view for the rest of time, it is just where I currently stand. In terms of the people around me, my mother is a supporter of Labour whereas my dad is a supporter of Reform UK allowing me an insight into why regular people vote the way they do on both sides of the spectrum, as well as causing many arguments at the dinner table. 

This general election was a strange one to witness and it is where I plan to start. Many people my age who I spoke to about it all cared very little and just seemed apathetic to every choice. But then there was another side, I saw a wave of support for reform amongst people my age (usually coming in the form of posts on social media). Reform’s meteoric rise within the polls is I think the most telling sign that people are angry, I have had many conversations with their voters (my entire dad’s side of the family blindly supporting them while not even knowing our local candidates name) and I agreed with very little of why they voted that way but I understood it, they felt let down; illegal immigration is a serious issue, brexit tensions are still echoing around and the cost of living is causing everyone issues. I feel politics is becoming some kind of strange echo chamber to most people, no one can debate or think for themselves they just find a cause to blindly follow (whether that being on the left or the right) and in the end people are just engulfed with misinformation from all angles of politics making them disinterested to the whole thing. Even I have definitely fallen victim to it, I think everyone has because it is impossible not to. This all culminated in a confusing general election, I felt very conflicted and unsure of who to vote for, I looked into party manifestos and tended to just get a feeling of half baked policy platforms that were not deeply enough explained or just contained some level of misinformation. While I did end up voting I still had a sinking feeling that I just shouldn’t have bothered. 

Previously, in the build up to the election, I reached out to all of my local candidates with several questions in order to try and get a sense of what they offered, who they were and in what direction they were going to take my local constituency, I received responses from three candidates (Reform, Lib Dems and Conservatives) and they proved useful in effecting how I voted, eventually going for Liberal Democrats because I was a fan of the ideas proposed to me, those of local empowerment in order to disburden the NHS (through local health initiatives that would cost less than just throwing money at the problem)  and challenging the myth that a closer relationship with the EU would be detrimental. However I did not find a perfect fit to vote for, with their focus on green initiatives not being where I think the economy should focus as nuclear is in my opinion much more cost effective and viable. There were aspects of most parties I saw merit in and that made voting difficult. The night of the election, the outcome was predictable and while I hold little love for Starmer’s Labour I have remained cautiously optimistic that change will happen in the future. 

Moving on to more recent events, the riots over the past few days have definitely caught my eye. They have been frankly disgusting to witness and the true realisation of just how divided people are on a local level really set in when I was sat in an airport in Dublin watching the EDL smash up a Travel Lodge on a livestream. The fact of the matter is that children were killed, this has nothing to do with your political agenda and if you take part you are actively crippling the country you claim to love. Honestly this has been very polarising to see and is actually the reason I chose to write this, I wanted to reflect and take a step back in order to look how politics has made me feel over the past couple months. Starmer should and hopefully will take a more aggressive stance with tackling all forms of violent protest or he does not deserve to be in the position he is in, he cannot stumble his way through this like he did with most of the televised debates and it will prove a true test of his leadership. 

So then how has recent politics made me feel? Depressed. This is a topic which I enjoy looking into all aspects of, I am still at the start of my journey and often have a feeling of impostor syndrome when writing these, as to be quite honest who really cares what a 19 year old thinks. But I'm writing this anyway because it is how I feel and if no one else cares, at least in a few years I can look back and see how my views have changed.