Last Tuesday, just 5% of students voted in the Student’s Union’s referendum to abolish referendums.
The SU, while expecting a poor turnout, was still surprised at the low number of students voting. The SU Commander-In-Chief commented: “It’s a shame. We thought we’d managed to bridge the gap with the student body. This time, we were offering free Twilight box sets, that’s what all the children do be watching these days.”
The referendum has abolished all further referendums in DCU from ever taking place. While this could be used by the SU to implement an authoritarian regime, the SU maintain that they did it because organising referendums was “pure effort”.
Their choice would seem to be vindicated by the voter turnout, which was at its lowest ever level, despite SU efforts to make voting more accessible and easier than ever before. To minimalise effort, students were offered the choice to vote by pointing at the option they liked most, flipping a coin, or blinking (once for yes, twice for no).
A high turnout had always looked unlikely, as it had been raining and Copperface Jacks nightclub had a student special of €57 for two shots the night before. As one anonymous student, Ed Doherty, put it “Rain is wet and I was…tired from the night out. Plus you have to actually walk to the voting booth, you can’t just think about it from your bed. What is this, 2009?”
Doherty went on to say that “If I can’t do it by in my room, on my laptop, in the dark then I don’t want to do anything at all. Hang on…”
DCU SU says that it had considered implementing some form of online voting, but gave up when they discovered that most DCU students still regarded the internet as a form of black magic. “If it’s not Joe Duffy, how do I know it’s telling the truth?” one very confused journalism student remarked.
Any success that the SU may have had with luring students to voting booths was undone when a Larkfield resident foolishly ordered four Dominos pizzas. The resulting stampede left seven students with minor injuries and four with satisfyingly full stomachs.
The SU vice deputy subcommittee for referendums commented that “We always knew that it was going to be tough to get students interested, what with Spar and snooker tables to compete with. But those pizzas were the real nail in the coffin. There’s just some stuff that student politics can’t contend with, and takeaway pizzas seems to be one of those things. Like Argos catalogues.”
In an online poll conducted by someone important after the referendum, DCU students were asked why they didn’t vote (after being bribed with pizza). The answers ranged from “Not bothered” to “No point” to “I’m a Communist”, with the most popular response being “I’m just a Communications student, what do you expect me to do?” DCU SU declined to comment further, and is currently investigating the possibility of nicotine being a key ingredient in Domino’s pizza.
Paul O’Donoghue
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