{"id":2184,"date":"2015-02-24T01:43:23","date_gmt":"2015-02-23T22:43:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/?p=2184"},"modified":"2015-03-20T01:08:22","modified_gmt":"2015-03-19T22:08:22","slug":"how-my-great-gran-defeated-voter-apathy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/?p=2184","title":{"rendered":"How my great gran defeated voter apathy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Photograph:<\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n

This article by Dean Burnett, appeared on the Guardian Newspaper website in the Science section on the 2nd February 2015. Thanks to Dean who gave us permission to add it to our website. Actual article is to be found here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

“This is meant to be a science blog, so officially this post is about how tangible outcomes and involvement can provide psychological\u00a0motivation<\/a>, in the context of the upcoming general election.<\/p>\n

Truthfully, this is a story about my great gran (pictured), one I heard only recently but felt compelled to share. And since I have this platform, I\u2019m doing just that.<\/p>\n

Some background. Evelyn Seaward (although everyone called her \u2018Mam\u2019 Seaward) was born October 1908 and died August 2003, aged 95. She lived all her life in\u00a0the Garw Valley<\/a>, north of Bridgend, South Wales, in the village of\u00a0Pontycymer<\/a>, where I also lived until age 18.<\/p>\n

\"Photograph:
Evelyn Seaward, scourge of voter apathy. Photograph: Dean Burnett<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I was 21 when she passed, so had the privilege of knowing her well, but only as a classic example of a cheery old lady; white haired, doddering, mischievous, given to saying things both playful (e.g. \u201cI don\u2019t know what I\u2019m going to do when I get old\u201d) and worryingly dark (\u201cIf I could live my life again, I wouldn\u2019t live this long. It\u2019s just a hassle\u201d).<\/p>\n

She raised many children successfully with little money and often single handed, what with her husband always down the coal mine that was the reason for the community\u2019s existence. She must have been a strong, vital person, I just never witnessed this directly. But then I found out about her Election Day habits, and I had to re-evaluate my concept of who I\u2019d been dealing with throughout my childhood.<\/p>\n

Mam Seaward was the typical formidable matriarch you find in rural Wales and similar small communities. For the Pratchett fans, think\u00a0Nanny Ogg<\/a>\u00a0from Discworld. Coincidentally, Mam Seaward\u2019s birthday was October 31st, meaning she was (affectionately) referred to as \u201cthe old witch\u201d.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a single bridge in Pontycymer, connecting both sides of the valley. Most of her life, Mam Seaward lived next to the bridge on one side, so this side was her \u201cterritory\u201d. Every Election day, the designated polling station was also right by her house, so Mam Seaward would set up a table outside and sit there all day with her red rosette and pamphlets (we\u2019re talking about an aged Welsh valleys resident here so she was\u00a0Labour<\/a>\u00a0to the core, although\u00a0old\u00a0<\/em>Labour that is; no idea what she\u2019d make of this new lot).<\/p>\n

Her (self-appointed?) job was to encourage passers-by to vote. And by \u201cencourage\u201d, I mean bark \u201chave you voted yet?\u201d at anyone she knew, which was everyone. There were two acceptable answers; \u201cYes\u201d, or \u201cI\u2019m definitely going to\u201d. Any other response was simply not permitted.<\/p>\n

You might think people would ignore or dismiss this nosey old biddy, sticking her uninvited nose in like some\u00a0working-class Jessica Fletcher<\/a>. You would be wrong; her co-villagers may not have cared about governments or politics, but they cared about crossing Mam Seaward.<\/p>\n

Any indication that you weren\u2019t going to vote meant you got glared at. And nothing burns through voter apathy (or anything else) faster than the glare of a furious Welsh gran. If you doubt this then you clearly have never been glared at by a furious Welsh gran. It would make a\u00a0basilisk<\/a>\u00a0tremble. So yes, everyone voted.<\/p>\n

All day she sat guarding the bridge, like some socialist troll. So why didn\u2019t people just avoid her if they really didn\u2019t want to vote? Just give the polling station a wide berth until the polls close. Surely someone must have thought of that? Indeed they did. Unfortunately, so did Mam Seaward.<\/p>\n

Remember, she knew\u00a0everyone!<\/em>\u00a0And she kept count. As it got closer to polls closing, Mam Seward would check her list and if anyone hadn\u2019t voted yet she\u2019d send her granddaughter (my own long-suffering mother)\u00a0to go and get them<\/em>. A young girl appearing at your door isn\u2019t the most intimidating thing in the world, but her saying \u201cMam Seaward says you\u2019ve got to come and vote\u201d apparently is, because nobody ever resisted for long.<\/p>\n

Every election day, she\u2019d do the same. In these days of\u00a0voter turnout decline<\/a>\u00a0it\u2019s difficult to imagine someone caring so much about voting, let alone having the fortitude to cajole an entire community to do it too. Where did this enthusiasm come from? It\u2019s a common complaint that\u00a0old people vote more<\/a>, but does anyone stop to wonder why?<\/p>\n

In my great gran\u2019s case, she was already\u00a0twenty years old<\/em>\u00a0when women were\u00a0first allowed to vote<\/a>. And she saw all the wars and depressions that tore communities apart, caused by decisions from people on high that they had no control over. With all that, who wouldn\u2019t embrace the right to participate as soon as you\u2019d finally got it?<\/p>\n

Was Mam Seaward\u2019s zeal due to her being resistant to change, a charge usually levelled at older voters? Definitely not; mentioning \u201cthe good old days\u201d to her was a guaranteed way to get a furious lecture about how dreadful the good old days were. Every development in her life (e.g. the\u00a0founding of the NHS<\/a>) made things better, and she wanted this to keep happening. She might have occasionally expressed some views of foreigners in-keeping with UKIP\u2019s, but Nigel Farage would sooner get a clip round the ear than Mam Seaward\u2019s vote.<\/p>\n

2015 General election<\/a>\u00a0coverage has started, and is already nothing but\u00a0cover-ups<\/a>,\u00a0scandal,<\/a>\u00a0pessimism<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0recriminations<\/a>, all centred around the wealthy residents of Westminster. You can see why many people get angrier about losing WIFI signal than the opportunity to vote. But as the\u00a0Scottish referendum<\/a>, the\u00a0recent Greece election<\/a>\u00a0and my great gran\u2019s example show, it doesn\u2019t have to be this way. If people can associate voting with actual outcomes, they are very keen to do it.<\/p>\n

The next election may look like it offers more of the same, but it\u2019s\u00a0rarely ever been so uncertain<\/a>. It\u2019s all to play for, so I\u2019m sorry\u00a0Russell Brand<\/a>\u00a0but the more people who vote, the better. Even if it\u2019s just to spoil a ballot, that\u2019s a way of showing politicians you\u2019re not happy with the choices available. Not turning up doesn\u2019t do that; take it from a scientist, you can\u2019t make decisions based on data you don\u2019t have.<\/p>\n

So I\u2019m going to follow my great gran\u2019s example and vote this May, and I\u2019ll do it keenly. I can only urge others to do the same. Whatever the Election results, let\u2019s try and make them legitimate.<\/p>\n

Also, you wouldn\u2019t want to be on the receiving end of that glare. And if you think her passing away might prove an obstacle to this, then you didn\u2019t know Mam Seaward.”<\/p>\n

Dean Burnett is rarely this sentimental in public, as demonstrated by his Twitter feed.\u00a0@garwboy<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article by Dean Burnett, appeared on the Guardian Newspaper website in the Science section on the 2nd February 2015. Thanks to Dean who gave us permission to add it to our website. Actual article is to be found here. “This is meant to be a science blog, so officially this post is about how…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,145],"tags":[132,133,131],"class_list":["post-2184","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-stories","category-politics","tag-election","tag-politics","tag-vote"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2184"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2186,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184\/revisions\/2186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.garwheritage.co.uk\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}