[user104658]

Originally Posted by Oliver_W

I've been thinking about certain politicians' response to this result, and I think it borders on contemptuous for the Rochdale electorate.

It's all very well wondering what it might mean for their party, if it might be extrapolatable to the upcoming general election. It's also understandable to talk about how to might reflect on feelings of antisemitism.

But to outright call it alarming, and to suggest Galloway shouldn't even be an MP? He won by quite a margin, so that's potentially a lot of people they're pissing off.

Even if it was a vote to "keep the others out", it's still people's democratic voices they're shouting over.

I'm inclined to agree, full democracy either works or it doesn't. I'm happy for people to explore the idea that it simply doesn't and maybe there are actually better options - for example, I'm low key an advocate for semi-meritocracy where there are criteria that need to be met in order to run at all (so long as that criteria allows for a diverse range of candidates) - however when we have the system we have, coming along and saying "Yes we say you can vote but listen... you did the voting WRONG!!" is a complete farce.