The AV Club...

[Note how I resisted calling it 'You're AVin' a Laugh' or something.]

The big news issue of the day is, of course, the debate surrounding the forthcoming referendum on the Audio Visual method of electing our MPs and many publications/websites etc. seem to be focusing on the battle lines being drawn not only between parties but within them too, not to mention between coalition partners.

Alternative Vote is a simple idea, albeit in a fairly complicated way. You select not only your first choice but also your second choice meaning that if your first choice is eliminated due to no-one reaching the 50% threshold your vote carries over to the second choice until eventually the least hated party/person ends up in power. Clegg, who had originally called AV 'a miserable little compromise', now leads the charge in support of it only to be turned on by David Cameron (trouble in paradise?) who claims it is 'inherently unfair' and went so far as to say that under AV we could end up with a party in charge that no-one wanted or even actually voted for. Well, phew, Dave, just as well that didn't happen in the last election, eh?

The main point is however that this is an issue where party politics has almost gone out of the window, where PM and Deputy can face off against each other, where cabinet ministers can disagree, where Prezza can be furious with Ed Miliband. The best analogy I can think of (in my tiny, nerd-culture addled brain) is Marvel's Civil War crossover comics from 2006/7, written by the incomparable Mark Millar. A government initiative demanding the registration of superheroes leads Captain America to abscond from his duty to round up the rogue masks and fall in with an anti-registration group, quickly becoming their figurehead along with other prominent figures such as Luke Cage and Cable. Meanwhile Cap's old friend and co-Avenger/Ultimate Tony Stark thinks it impossible in the current political landscape to resist this change and continue to self-police and gathers his own team of higher-profile heroes (She-Hulk, Mister Fantastic and even Spider-Man who unmasks especially) to hunt down the resistance.

As the plot develops amid much tragedy, the Human Torch and Invisible Woman side against their intrepid leader Mister Fantastic, Spider-Man turns coat after discovering some of the more unpleasant features of the act and ultimately they all cause more damage with their 'Civil War' than either the Registration Act itself or any resistance to it would have done in the first place... oh, and Captain America is assassinated on some courthouse steps.

Now, what does this have to do with AV? Is Prezza a Luke Cage, punching his way against the reform, or is he more of a Ben Grimm trying to protect the interests of civillians and keep himself in pies and insurance comparison ads? Will Cameron be gunned down on some stairs by Crossbones? Is Clegg going to don a suit of fictional metal and laser his way to some actual power?

No... or at least I'd be very surprised. The main point is that it's interesting to see individuals pitched against each other within their own groups. Public hostility to politics (like public hostility to heroes in the wake of Hulk's smashing of Las Vegas or Nitro's explosive murder of 600 people) is likely to lead to a 'yes' vote, argue some commentators, but then there are surely many who think FPtP flawed but that AV is just a way of keeping things much the same but different enough to fool most people into thinking there doesn't need to be a proper change for another 400 years.

In any case, it looks like this one will run and run (and I am in no way qualified really to talk about any of it or discuss any ramifications).

Just as a quick straw poll/trial, please comment on how you would vote (1st, 2nd and 3rd choices please) in the referendum.

1) Yes to AV
2) No to AV
3) What does it all mean? Why can't we just go home?


This week Sam watched: True Grit. A masterpiece. Towering performance from Bridges, fantastic script from the Coens and if Deakins doesn't win the Oscar for cinematography it's a crime. A masterclass in film-making.