Wednesday, November 10, 2004

 

Is P-Diddy a Man of his Word?

by Guest-Blogger Matthew Cody




Well it has been less than a week since the promise of a restored America and genuine presidential accountability went ka-plooey.

And as we Democrats wander back and forth sharing a sort of communal, open-mouthed stare, perhaps we can summon up the last reserves of energy for a time-honored, post-election moratorium -– blame.

I was originally going to title this piece, “Rock What Vote?” or “Let’s Raise the Voting Age to Twenty-Five and Be Done With It”, but as I wrote a stronger theme started to emerge, a thesis if you will, based upon the promises of political activist and all around dawg. . . . P-Diddy.

He promised us throngs of empowered younglings wielding the sword of civic duty. He promised us that this election would be the election where the 18-24 year olds actually got involved. And he wasn’t alone. He was backed by some of the best political minds in the biz, names like Ashton and Christina. And the pundits surely took them at their word, predicting that the election of 2004 was going to be a revolution. Really, this time they’ll show up, seriously we mean it!

The Dean Machine revealed a new culture of blogger-activists that were determined to shake off the slacker image of their disinterested predecessors, my generation, Gen X. Joe Trippi dubbed them “Generation e”, for the empowered generation. As the lines formed outside the polling places of Ohio, journalists declared that we were witnessing the power of the young vote, and that Kerry would be the one to benefit. He would ride into the Whitehouse abreast an army of the Young and the Restless. Multi-tasking, IMing, Democrats – IPODocrats we might call them. Estimates were as high as 60% young voter turnout. Amazing. It seemed like it was all worth it.

So . . . .what happened? Well, for one thing the percentage of 18-24 year olds who voted in 2004 stayed exactly the same as 2000, roughly 10 percent. Ten. Percent. No change. One in ten. A generational revolution turned out to be just another generational shrug.

So that’s it. No more. Its time to give up on them. Look at it this way, if we just write them off as a group, then we won’t have to sit through another “Choose or Lose” campaign of “How can we dumb down the issues of the campaign enough to get you kids interested?” There is no demographic in this country as pandered to as the “coveted” 18-24 year old. Its bad enough they have their own network – MTV - a vapid wasteland of commercial entertainment if there ever was one – except for once every four years when they decide to “get real ya’ll” about voting. The networks and print magazines get in on the action too, and political action committees use complex computer models to gauge the impact of ass-kissing for votes that are just not there.

When heiress-turned-tv star-turned-pornstar-turned-political activist Paris Hilton becomes a voting advocate, but forgets to register herself – I’m telling you someone needs to get their ass kicked. Please mommy, make it all stop.

There should be one message for the youth and it should go something like this -Voting is not “cool”. It’s frustrating, it’s dull in its mechanics and heart-breaking in its importance. It is, in short, grown-up. And for far too long a lot of grown-ups have been wasting an awful lot of time, energy and money trying to get you to vote. But you refuse. So we get the message. Loud and Clear. Maybe some of you were still too depressed over the scandal that Ashlee doesn’t actually sing. Understandable. But now its time to pay the piper.

We are taking your concerts away. That’s right, rock and hip hop is taking away your “Rock the Vote” concert privileges. And no more Meet-Up parties, you’ll have to get laid the old fashioned way – you’ll have to earn it with your own beer. No more tee-shirts, no more buttons. Will Farrell will keep his Bushisms to himself, thank you very much.

All of this brings me back to the title of this piece, and I’ll grant you, a rather grim conclusion. P-Diddy is an entrepreneur, a man of his word and his followers have been wearing message, his promise for months. He is connected, he has power, he can make good on his promise and deliver. He came on the TV in dark shades and impressive bling and told me so. He promised us.

“Vote or Die” he said.

Sorry, kiddies but I for one am hoping they broadcast the bloodbath. In between The Real World and Punked would do nicely, I think.

Author’s Disclaimer: I know that this rant is a gross generalization and that there were many hard working, dedicated young people who worked tirelessly on the behalf of many campaigns. To them, I give my thanks. All I can say is – tell it to P-Diddy as he knifes you in the kidneys.

posted by Dan 1:02 PM
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