So yesterday was spent, as is becoming usual for a Saturday, in Springburn, helping with Willie Bains campaign. Yesterday however I took 4 members of the St Andrews uni Labour club with me.
Now I don't think for a minute that I'm going to change the world but I do think that being a real person, with real life experience's behind me makes me useful in the modern political sphere. But I'm beginning to think maybe I'm just being humoured and patronised and what we're really going to end up with are more of the kind of people I had to listen to between St Andrews and Glasgow yesterday (that's nearly a 2 hour journey by the way).
The young men in question were totally without malice and most of them were quite charming and I stress it is not my natural bent to character assassinate the young but.........
During a pit stop for McBreakfast during which I made the polite "what are you studying, where are you from, what do you want to do when you grow up?" type conversation I was met with questions about my personal ethics, attitude towards the environment and care for the health of our children. Not just my own children, as I'm not sure the questioner even bothered to ascertain that I had any, he meant the worlds children. All this for enjoying a hash brown, bacon McMuffin (no cheese) and a latte. I should have ran to the car and drive off alone then when I had my chance.
To be honest the conversation in the car was increasingly getting above my head and my poor knowledge of sustainable development and the political history of Sierra Leone was obvious. When the conversation did get so simple I could engage with it I was left questioning myself more than I normally care to.
A pertinent local issue, the University of St Andrews wish to replace what is currently the cheapest accommodation with what will be the most expensive. A student group (Fair Rents Now) are mounting a protest and they're quite typically young, studenty and maybe a teeny bit naive about it but at the same time- right. I fully support their call for the University to think again and to design facilities aimed at students and widening access as opposed to aiming development at the lucrative conference and tourist market.
One of my travel companions was disgusted by the work of this group and constantly referred to them as "the far left". Now forgive me for thinking (and saying) if students can't be left wing then who can? Apparently I'm "unrealistic" and I "should read more" (he even threw in a couple of recommendations).
....Sigh.....
My travel companions conversation then turned to climate change and how it was the most important thing in the world but people didn't seem particularly concerned. Now considering myself to be "people" or at least one of them, I tried to explain that it would actually be a bit of a luxury to spend a lot of time thinking about climate change. Again, this was the wrong answer and I was duly chastised. I was merely trying to explain if you're day to day is taken up with worries about school, your job, your mortgage, your elderly parents, your broken boiler then if the best you can do to address climate change is a spot of recycling and composting- who's to criticise?
So today as I reflect on yesterday I realise that my political future is probably going to be a lot shorter and a lot less influential than that of those I encountered yesterday. Sure I know my stuff and I can talk to anybody and a lot of the time "I've been there" but I don't do the theory and I think it's unfair to expect people to see the global picture if they're driven to distraction by toothache because they can't find an NHS dentist or they can't watch the news because they're short and can't top up the meter.
Perhaps people like me make good activists but I think you'll find it's people like them that make policy.
I have nothing in common with the young men I met yesterday. We all carry the same membership card and we all claim to subscribe to the same values but that's where it ends.
If it were not for party loyalty I'm not sure they'd vote for me when the time comes but, to be honest I'm not sure I could vote for any of them either.
I'm glad that the rest of my day was taken up with meeting people on the doorstep and talking to other members who are a bit less (*desperately searches for the right word*.....*tries not to use "wanky"*.....*almost writes "middle-class"*)....theoretical or I may have gone home and wept.
Ultimately it was a good day and I felt I'd done my little bit for the cause, even if I'm a little less clear as to what the cause really is.
Perhaps I just feel threatened by the young, even though I can drive, have regular sex and enjoy the X Factor in a non-ironic way. Perhaps I'm idealistic and uneducated and can't see the bigger picture?
I wonder if Amazon sell that book...........