{"id":134191,"date":"2014-12-03T00:01:20","date_gmt":"2014-12-02T18:31:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/?p=134191"},"modified":"2014-12-07T00:02:58","modified_gmt":"2014-12-06T18:32:58","slug":"insulting-the-common","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/insulting-the-common\/","title":{"rendered":"Insulting \u2018The Common\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Malinda Seneviratne<\/a><\/span>\u00a0–<\/strong>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Malinda<\/a>

Malinda Seneviratne<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018Podu Apekshakaya\u2019<\/i> (common candidate<\/span><\/a>) screams one set of people.\u00a0 \u2018Podu apekshaawa\u2019<\/i> (common hope) screams another. We are in \u2018podu\u2019 or \u2018common\u2019 days. The days of the people. Common people. Voters, to be precise.<\/p>\n

The \u2018commoners\u2019 have got their once-every-six years (well, every four years, since of late) moment. They will be salaamed. They will be placated with promises. They will be championed. They will be promised better representation. This is also the moment of the politician, therefore. Politicians, friends, are full of promises.<\/p>\n

But where is the \u2018common\u2019 truly located in our economy, in our political structures, in the institutional arrangement? The \u2018common\u2019 are spoken for, but they rarely speak. It\u2019s all a hand-me-down system. The benefits of development rise up; what goes \u2018down\u2019 is a trickle. Decisions are top-made and then handed down. There are of course those who rose from the \u2018commons,\u2019 let\u2019s say, but there\u2019s little commonness in them. This is true of those in power and those who aspire to replace them.<\/p>\n

\"maithri<\/a>The people vote. The people choose. Then never get candidates who are at the time of candidacy like them. This is why candidates refer to roots, humble beginnings and commonality \u2013 all of which have to be spoken of in the past tense. If there are \u2018common\u2019 candidates (and there are), they don\u2019t have a chance in hell of making any kind of impact on the outcome of major elections. They are also-rans. The political economy of elections is just not skewed in favor of the common.<\/p>\n

In the coming weeks when \u2018the common\u2019 are supposed to take center stage, you won\u2019t find anyone of that overwhelming majority on any of the political platforms. Well, there could be a few actually, but they\u2019ll probably be doing security duty or an usher\u2019s job or handing out drinks to the worthies who get to speak. The commoners will be spoken to and spoken for, but they will not speak. They\u2019ll cheer, sure, but that\u2019s small consolation all things considered in a representative democracy.<\/p>\n

It is not that the entire voting population is deluded. They know all this. It is not that they are in a feudal bind. They know of fetters, they know what\u2019s what, what\u2019s pragmatic to expect and na\u00efve to demand. So they express preference not so much because they are swayed by \u2018common\u2019 rhetoric but the possible tidbits that might come their way.<\/p>\n

This is why there\u2019s no such thing as a podu jana pethuma <\/i>\u00a0(common people\u2019s hope) or podu jana apekshakaya<\/i> (common people\u2019s candidate). What are really out there are candidates. Real, live candidates.\u00a0 Personal agendas. Personal ambitions.\u00a0 Voters, as such, are just temporary necessities to secure such things. Dispensable the moment-after.<\/p>\n

Should the common voter just stay home on election day, though? No. Like those uncommon but commonality-pleading politicians they vote for, voters weigh consequences, calculate risks, consider relative merits. They compare. They contrast.\u00a0 They watch. They wait.<\/p>\n

For now, \u2018the common\u2019 are ok with \u2018go along with it\u2019.\u00a0 They are ok with being spoken for. They are ok with being silent, marginalized or seldom heard. The system will survive and part of the reason is the slight rise in hope that change and possible-change bring. But there could come a time when \u2018the common\u2019 might wonder if the whole this is not just a farce but a process that is geared to scribble a descriptive addition to their tag to make them \u2018common suckers\u2019.<\/p>\n

People don\u2019t like being insulted. They will suffer robbery. They will live through exploitation. Humiliation is something else. This is election time.\u00a0 It is also a time of massive humiliation. The candidates should at least be conscious of this.<\/p>\n

Just don\u2019t take \u2018the common\u2019 for granted.<\/p>\n

*Malinda Seneviratne is the Chief Editor of \u2018The Nation\u2019\u00a0and his articles can be found at\u00a0www.malindawords.blogspot.com<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":105560,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,46,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-134191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colombotelegraph","category-constitutional-reforms","category-editorial"],"yoast_head":"\nInsulting \u2018The Common\u2019 - Colombo Telegraph<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/insulting-the-common\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Insulting \u2018The Common\u2019 - Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"[…]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/insulting-the-common\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Colombo Telegraph\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-12-02T18:31:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-12-06T18:32:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/Malinda-Seneviratne-150x150.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"130\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"135\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"COLOMBO TELEGRAPH\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/insulting-the-common\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.colombotelegraph.com\/index.php\/insulting-the-common\/\",\"name\":\"Insulting \u2018The Common\u2019 - 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