The Who Will You Vote For Conversation – #Dad6and11 Ep 1

Somewhere in suburbia a few Sundays out from a Federal Election, a dad and his two primary school kids (6 and 11) are going for a walk:

6yo: So who are you going to vote for Dad?

11yo: That’s private

6: Why?

11: It’s like going to the toilet. They have booths like in a public toilet.

6: Why?

11: So no one can see who you voted for

6: Oh. In case you voted for the baddies

Dad: It’s not about goodies and baddies

11: Nan says it is

6: Nan goes for Collingwood

Dad: It’s not like football. The winner of the election has to govern the whole country. It’s a huge responsibility.

6: Like Lunch Order Duty

11: No, silly. Way bigger.

6: Oh, like Grade 1D Planet Captain?

11: Yeah. Like that. As if soft plastics recycling is going to fix Climate Change.

6: I ate Toby’s muesli bar so we could put an extra wrapper in

Dad: Every bit helps

11: But what if it’s not enough, Dad? We looked at this in integrated studies and neither big party is doing enough to reduce emissions.

6: Toby’s having a big party

11: Not that sort of party. It means group of politicians, people we choose to be the bosses of the whole country. There’s 2 big parties, Labor and Liberal, and lots of smaller parties.

6: Like the Greens!

Dad: How do you know about them?

6: Grandpa has a t shirt. And a bumper sticker on his electronic car. It says THE GREENS.

11: Nan hates the Greens

6: She said they should be called the Reds. I agree!

11: You don’t know what you’re talking about

6: Yes I do. Red is way better than green.

Dad: See, it’s not about teams or colours. Hating one party or having a bumper sticker for them, makes it like football

6: I like football.

Dad: So do I. But getting a ball through sticks and making decisions that affect everyone everywhere, you can’t compare them. Politics isn’t the same as sport.

11: The media makes it look like sport – our class compared a sport report and a politics report and they were quite similar

Dad: Yeah, I guess so. Some media can make it into goodies and baddies, like barracking for a team.

6: So which party is the baddies?

11: It depends which website you read

6: Mathletics

Dad: You stick to that for now

6: But I want to vote!

11: Me too. Old people in suits sit around arguing while my planet-

6: It’s not just YOUR planet

Dad: It’s both your planet, and yes you kids will be around long after the politicians of today are gone. So I try to vote *for* you.

6: You’ll vote for me? So I get to be the boss of the whole country?

11: You’d be a shit prime minister

Dad: Oi, language.

6: That’s unfair. Grandpa said we’ve had 3 shit priminsters, and no one told him off

11: Nan did, she said they were way better than the bloody ones before that

Dad: Well I’ll tell them both off

6: Ooooh

11: It won’t make them behave any better. They’re like the old people in Canberra, just arguing all the time, not agreeing on ways to fix our problems.

6: I would vote for you

11: Really?

Dad: You know, I think I would too.

6: (whispering) but you would have to not tell ANYONE

#Dad6and11