The EU Referendum

As you may or may not know. I'm English. And 17, so just too young to vote. The EU referendum is a big topic right now, so I figured I might as well throw my opinion out there with all of the others. I'm sorry I didn't post much lately, but exams have been taking all of my time.

What annoys me the most about this Referendum, is that I and many of my friends didn't even get to vote in it.

If you look at the polls, the 16-18 group were strongly for remaining in the EU. At school, we had a vote in the 6th form (16-18 year olds) to see what we would vote. It was a 97% majority to remain.

So all these people, who wanted to remain in the EU, the ones who are going to be more directly affected by it than most of the voters. They didn't even get a voice. Meanwhile, the people who voted to leave? The majority were the elderly. The people who are retired, and won't have to deal with the impact on the future that Brexit will have.

We are the ones doing university in this. We are the ones who'll have to get jobs in a shaky financial market because of this. We are, if I'm bluntly honest, the people who will be affected by this. And if we got a voice, the slim difference means that the result would most likely be different. But we didn't get a voice.

That's not fair.

That's not right.

Yet we're the ones who have to live with it anyway.

Honestly, I didn't really bother to go into much detail in my research on the Referendum, because, really, there was no point. It wasn't like I was going to have a chance to cast my vote on voting day. But it is the principle of it, that there are thousands of people who wanted a vote, and weren't allowed to get one.

If there's any argument for lowering the voting age to 16, this is it. Why should we be forced to live in a world that is messed up by the previous generation?

So, that's my view. Maybe I'm just being a whiny Millennial. But if wanting to have a voice about my future is whiny, call me whiny. Because I'm not going to shut up anytime soon.

NaPoWriMo! - Days 28-30

So, this is the final day for NaPoWriMo, and I've got three poems to write. On Thursday, I just didn't feel inspired, yesterday I was busy, and I'm writing them today. So I hope you enjoy these poems.

By the way, I'm not planning on abandoning this blog once NaPoWriMo is over, but I'm probably going to write more prose, just because that's what I find more interesting to write. It may be short stories, but I've also got a longer story I've been planning for a while.

NaPoWriMo! - Day 27

Hi again! I don't think I really followed the theme with this poem, but I like it anyway, so I hope you do too! Kind of cheesy, I know, but I'm tired from school, so yeah, I hope you enjoy it.

NaPoWriMo! - Day 26

Hi there! I didn't really like the prompt, so I ended up putting my own spin on it, and writing about a call and response where there isn't a response. I tried to turn it into a self-parody at the end, since I just suddenly thought of how crazy it would look if you were just calling into an empty room and expecting a response.

NaPoWriMo! - Day 25

Five days left on my poetry writing adventure (don't worry, I've got stuff lined up for afterwards - it's more prose those, since I prefer that), and today the prompt is to start with the opening line of a different poem, and split off from there. For this, I chose one of my favourite poems, The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost.

NaPoWriMo! - Days 23-24

I have to admit that the two themes for these two days didn't really inspire me that much. I gave up sonnets back in high school, and I couldn't really be bothered to faff around with my vocabulary to hope to make something decent. So instead I'm going to use a couple of prompts from the 2015 NaPoWriMo. The first one will be about bridges. I don't know why. I just feel that'd be cool.

Rope Bridge Between Us

There's not so far, between him and me.
And I could easily get there if I wanted to.
After all, the bridge will let me pass.
If I wasn't so scared to.

The bridge is far too scary though.
Made of rope, with minimal support.
The ropes are starting to wear thin.
Too thin for my liking.

I know that people use it everyday.
People, much taller and larger than I.
And they're not scared of the rope bridge.
But I guess I'm not that courageous.

I promise, that some day,
When years go by,
I'll gather my strength, to cross the rope bridge.
And then... I'll be with you again.

The second prompt that I'm borrowing is the idea of having poem that only contains dialogue. I kind of cheated at the end, but I think it's for the best.

Goodbye

"It's over."
"No, it can't be."
"You've done this for too long."
"That doesn't mean you have to leave me."

"Yes it does. I can't take this any more."
"But we'll still see each other... around?"
"I really don't want to. I don't want to see you again."
"But... please..."

"No. I'm not discussing it."
"You're not even giving me a chance."
"You've had more than enough chances."
"Please, just one more, I can change!"

"Goodbye."
"I'll never say goodbye."

Too bad, because I will.

NaPoWriMo! - Day 22

Okay, so I guess it's technically day 23 for me now, since I've stayed up far too late, but I'm just calling this day 22 anyway.

I wasn't really inspired for this Earth Day prompt. Is it more of a big thing in America? Because I didn't do Earth Day and I only knew about it because it was the Google image for today. It's that thing where you turn your lights off for an hour, and basically just use torches instead right? I think you'd get a larger audience if you framed it as a medieval reenaction instead.

Anyway, poem!