What Heinlein posited was that in future intergalactic societies the only individuals who would be allowed to vote would be war veterans, those who had fought and risked death for their society.Heinlein reckoned that only those individuals had earned the right to have a say in who governed them, plus the veterans would truly value their vote and would not throw it away by basing their decision on which candidate had the glibbest sound bites or looked nicest on the telly. Heinlein's ideas were, in their turn, based on those of ancient Sparta and, of course, on his own ravening reactionariness.However, up until the end of the Second World War there was generally a war involving Britain going on somewhere in the world, and the authorities felt that everybody was touched by it in some way, either by fighting or by sending a son to die in some foreign valley, and had therefore more or less earned the right to vote. Yet after the Second World War, it was clear that this experience of war was never likely to be repeated in our society, so it was decided in the latter part of the last century that the process of voting should become in itself a test of courage and fitness. So as my wife described it to me, voting is something like the opening sequence of the first Indiana Jones movie, combined with the medieval assault course Richard endured in the film First Knight. And of late those people in Derby who designed the Tomb Raider series of video games have kicked in a few new ideas.When you go into the polling station, you have to run the gauntlet of a variety of perils, including poison arrows fired from the walls, zombies armed with blood-stained hatchets, steel traps and giant voter-eating spiders before you reach the Chamber of Voting, where you finally get to make your choice of candidate.
I suppose it's no surprise, when you think about it, that voting figures are going down, when you have to go through that lot simply in order to help the Liberal Democrats come second in Camden.Still and all, I sometimes wonder about voting myself, and on election day I often go down to the local primary school and I hang about close to the entrance, straining my senses. As the housewives and senior citizens push past me, eager to brave the zombies, with no sign of fear showing on their faces, I fancy I can hear the swish of the chopping saws and the hiss of the poison arrows, and I think I can just see the gleam of the flashing blades. I summon up my courage to enter, but then it fails me once again, so again I slink home, ashamed Brave Voters of Britain I salute your courage.. For nearly a year, Serena de la Hey's 40-foot Willow Giant a landmark Year of the Artist commission has stood alongside the M5 motorway in Somerset, welcoming travellers to the South West. In the early hours of the May bank holiday it was burnt down.
As I thought disconsolately about this wanton act vandalism, I wondered whether this was simply an inevitable hazard faced by all works of public art, or evidence of a more deep-rooted lack of respect for those artists who strive consciously to reach out to a broader audience.Artists have always occupied a privileged yet fragile position in the public eye. For centuries, we have looked to artists to inspire and entertain us; to help us explore the limits of human nature and human possibilities; at times to lead debate and foment revolution By addressing the world in its sorrows and absurdities, in its moments of celebration and renewal, artists have helped us to understand our world and ourselves. The Year of the Artist set out to explore this territory. The Year of the Artist would for the first time be a nationwide event that looked across all the arts. The aim was to promote the value of individual creativity, raise the profile of the artist, and demonstrate the huge diversity of public settings in which today's artists work.Through residencies, projects, campaigns and conferences, Year of the Artist has challenged uninformed preconceptions and prejudices about what the arts are about and who they are for. For many people, the arts still carry with them the whiff of ?tism, the assumption that the arts are for the few and not the many. Yet across the country, millions of people from all walks of life have witnessed or taken part in projects.We set out to achieve 1,000 artists in a 1,000 places. In the event, we exceeded even our most optimistic expectations.
