Elections

Motivation
High school education was mostly a blur (actually, undergrad classes were a blur too, now that I'm thinking about them). I remember some minor details about organic chemistry. A bit of physics. Some biology. Almost nothing about calculus (XD). But in terms of direct life impact, Social Studies has had the heaviest direct lasting impact on me: regular reading of the news, and being a more aware citizen. Social Studies has repeatedly attempted to drill into my head that voting and being an aware citizen is a responsibility of a citizen in a democratic country. Democracy only really works when its members participate. Voting is a privilege, like drivers licenses. When I voted in the 2008 election, that was my biggest motivation to vote.

But since, I've gained another reasoning: my faith. I've realized that Evangelicals tend to crowd amongst ourselves. "What? Unchristianly influences? Lets pull out"...as William Craig noted in his article:

Who among evangelicals can stand up to the great secular or naturalistic or atheistic scholars on their own terms of scholarship? Who among evangelical scholars is quoted as a normative source by the greatest secular authorities on history or philosophy or psychology or sociology or politics? Does the evangelical mode of thinking have the slightest chance of becoming the dominant mode in the great universities of Europe and America that stamp our entire civilization with their spirit and ideas?

...For the sake of greater effectiveness in witnessing to Jesus Christ Himself, as well as for their own sakes, evangelicals cannot afford to keep on living on the periphery of responsible intellectual existence.

- Charles Malik (Quoted in In Intellectual Neutral)

[...our seminaries] produce pastors, not scholars, is that it is precisely our future pastors, not just our future scholars, who need to be intellectually engaged and to receive this scholarly training. Machen's article was originally given as a speech entitled "The Scientific Preparation of the Minister." A model for us here ought to be a man like John Wesley, a Spirit-filled revivalist and at the same time an Oxford-educated scholar. Wesley's vision of a pastor is remarkable: a gentleman, skilled in the Scriptures and conversant with history, philosophy, and the science of his day.

- William Craig (In Intellectual Neutral)

What he is trying to say is...Christians are so focused on just a single field (spiritual stuff, for example) and not about science or archeology, that we're propelling the stereotype that Christianity is scientifically backwards and not intellectually viable in today's day and age. As a result, when Christians pull out of scientific debates (and, given the context of this post, political/philosophical debates as well), which simply allows the "rest of the world" to continue as is, without Christian influence, which just allows the world to become more secularized. That's the reason he gives for his participation in religious, scientific and philosophical debates. That's also the reason why we should go out and vote.

Details about the Election
Since I'd be in Waterloo anyway between terms, I thought it would be interesting to sign up to work at the May 2 election. Coming from Electrical Engineering (at Waterloo, ECE is like 50% asian, 45% brown), you don't often walk into a room that's 90% filled with old Caucasian retirees...but I guess that's the typical demographics that can work on a Monday election. Maybe that's why they stuck me at the UWP polling station. Haha.

You should've gotten a Voter Information Card in your mail that tells you what your voting station is, based on your home address. Vote there. If you're not in your home region on May 2 (like myself), you could still register in KW, as long as you have a photo ID and proof of local residency (so like a utility bill or something). If your KW residency region is voting in UWP (you can check here), you can use your VIC as proof. Though, I'm guess that stuff will get lost in the mail between terms, so I'm not really expecting that much people using VICs as proof of residency at my polling station. Thus, the best thing to do is to participate in advance polling at your home region (which starts today, till the coming Monday).

Links and information
Rick Mercer (of "Talking to Americans" fame): video link. Apparently his videos are the instigator of "vote mobs" that's been popping up around universities all over the country. It's a short video with a simple message: university students need to go out and vote. He's right though. Not that much platforms addresses us, the university students. And no one cares about NSERC (funding agency for university research). Sighs.

In case you didn't want to look at everyone's platforms and figure out who's standing for what, CTV and Globe and Mail both have a platform summary of the major parties. And if you happen to be in Waterloo on May 2, your vote is pretty critical. Peter Braid, the current Kitchener-Waterloo MP, won by just 73 votes (though, it says 17 votes in the Waterloo Record) in 2008.

Elections Canada links: Information for students. IDs needed for voter registration at polling day (also applies if you're not in your home region).

Okay. Enough soap box for a day.