Thumbprint Democracy

Today, as I settle in to select something to watch on a lazy rainy Saturday from the customised Netlfix recommendations on my Smart TV, at the same as flicking through my personalised Facebook feed, and determining which things I want to see more of / hear less of / buy loads of, it strikes me and amazes me yet again that my unique and intimate life settings are accessible to me at the touch of my iphone home button from the comfort of my own sofa.

The digitally-enabled world is long-written and raved about (and against), and I promise I am not here to add to that chat. All I want to do is raise a topic that won’t let go of me, and first rose to the top of my consciousness around the time of the credit crunch, then again during the London 7/7 bombings, and again during the South London uprisings in 2011.

That last occurrence drove me to write about this idea in a Facebook post, copied here:

I write this at 5pm on 9th August 2011, on my way home early from a deserted office amongst a sea of other Londoners leaving town to be in the fortresses they call home.

The feeling I have right now is hard to describe, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who has it.

But here’s the thing: as I look out at the hordes of displaced Londoners trudging to safety, I don’t feel fear, or shock, or anger. It’s not even despair or frustration that I feel.

As I sit on this bus and look out at that sea of normal Londoners doing an abnormal thing, what strikes me is this: this is not true. This is not who we are. This in no way reflects the city I live in. This is not London. This is not us.

And I’ve felt it before. Just the once.

The last time I felt something similar, indeed the only other time I can recall anything resembling this feeling occurring, was on 7/7.

That day, as I learned that I’d lost a dear friend in the Aldgate bombing (a human rights lawyer who fought for the recognition of the very people who caused her death) I was struck by how misplaced the attack was, and how alien it was for it to happen to London. I remember Ken Livingstone standing on the steps of City Hall and proclaiming the bombing of a multicultural and tolerant London as a mistake, an aberration.

And there’s the thing… two aberrations, one city. But what link?

On 7/7, the bright among us took it as a sign of disenfranchised outsiders using excessive force to make their point — shocking the world into hearing that for too long they had been ignored, reviled, looked down on, demonised. Now, at the hands of their violence, London and the world would listen. And (whether we agreed with the methods or not) the truth is… London listened. And, in some respects at least, the world listened.

Last night (8/8 for symmetry fans) here was London, and here was I, once again feeling the violence to be a mistake, an aberration. An attack on the wrong target and the wrong issue.

But the thing that strikes me is this: could this violence equally be another set of outsiders desperately using excessive measures to be heard? This time a disenfranchised group, long ignored and long looked down on, but much closer to home. Our own. Our young. Our future?

The term Big Society is already a dirty term, but it supposedly has very real meaning for our government. Non-interventionist, with a belief that “society” (whoever they are) can deal with their own problems and ideals if left to their own devices, it believes the government’s role should be diminished. Last night we saw Big Society at work. And Big Society is not happy with the way things are. Not happy with Big Dave’s Big Idea.

Because Dave’s idea is not really as Big as it should be. His version of Big Society means Big Reduction in Government Expenditure on Society’s Needs, and Big Reduction in Corporate Taxes.

The thing that we all know (and some of us are forcibly showing) is that with big society comes big freedom. And big freedom needs to be checked by big responsibility. And big responsibility requires big recognition. And big recognition means big listening, and big changes.

But Dave’s not giving any of that.

Big Society requires us to look after ourselves, govern ourselves, police ourselves, organise ourselves. But our system of democracy and government has fallen behind. On the one hand, whilst we get 5 years between choosing a government by ticking a box, on the other the disenfranchised amongst us have 5 seconds between pushing a button and organising themselves on BBM to devastating effect and the responsible amongst us take 5 minutes to organise the clean up via twitter.

Which of these sides has truly understood Big Society more? Clue: it’s not Dave.

So what do we do?

Well, ironically the problem may also hold the key to the answer. In two ways.

Firstly, the answer may be in genuinely providing Big Society. By which I’m referring to the REAL meaning that could be ascribed to Big Society, not its poor politically-sloganeering sibling.

And secondly, the way to deliver it may well lie in applying the methods used by the currently disenfranchised and their community-minded neighbours to the system of democracy that governs them (and yet they should arguably use to govern themselves).

Is Dave big enough to hear what his society has to say about the matters of government every five minutes rather than every five years? Could he be big enough to harness the power of BBM, Twitter, and a socially-networked populace to deliver genuine, daily, real-time Democracy 2.0? Could he deliver on his PR-friendly Big Society by delivering Power-Threatening Big Democracy power by a digitally empowered nation, listening big to every man, woman, looter and cleaner amongst us?

Or is that far too big?

Now, Dave is gone. Boris did his drive-by. They left us Brexit as their parting gift. And Theresa and Donald as our new ‘hope’.

A lot of the recent aftermath has led to opened wounds, sore divisions, people of one ideology accusing those of another for the mess. But increasingly, I don’t see difference any more. I don’t see battle lines being drawn. For, whislt these lines and borders get the coverage, what I see achingly clearly now is the similarity behind all these ills.

You, and me, whether we are muslim, rich, gay, poor, white, black, faithful or faithless, whether we hope or hate, are educated, vengeful, ignorant, or graceful, however different we may feel… we are all beginning to feel the same: this world is ours, and yet it is run by people who run it not for us.

Whatever you think about President Trump, he is where he is precisely because he chose to represent those who felt unrepresented. And right now, speaking for the unspoken ‘will of the people’ is the winning ticket.

Farage manipulated a country’s desperate need to be heard, for his own selfish ends. Donald now does the same.

Leftwing and rightwing politicians (the very ones who have not been listening to the people they think they represent) will very soon exploit this new post-political dynamic for their own political ends.

And here I am staring down at my iphone home button. With the most representative element of my whole being resting upon it. The part of me that my phone company, my bank and even my government consider to be the single determiner of the most important aspects of my life: my thumbprint.

With a gentle press of this single digit I can unlock every aspect of the life I want. With the same trace of that print, my government can use it to take a decision over my guilt, my right to freedom, and my right to move over borders. My thumb, and yours, can command our phones, our payments, our decisions, our life choices. It speaks for us in all parts of our lives.

But it does not yet speak for our vote.

Whilst mobile technology has transformed everything else, its absence from our democratic lives is becoming more and more tragic.

We remain disconnected, unrepresented, disenfranchised. Which could all change at the touch of a (home) button.

That, my friends, calls for a revolution.

:)