Yea. The austrian smarchers were talking about this yesterday.

-X

sisterdew wrote:

another point to consider is that since this year the age for the right to vote has been set to 16 years, and not 18 as it was before.and many of the young voters have also voted for the FPÖ,probably because they have the simplest slogans

The Kurier claims that it's also because Strache (the leader of the FPÖ) appears to be young and, I dunno, cool or something, and sucks up to young people in discos and stuff. That's off the top of my head, and I'm tired, so I have no idea if it's true.
In any case, lowering the age is all well and good, but the kids gotta know what they're doing. Which means they must get proper political educations, and we all know schools suck.
(I got quite annoyed when there was an interview with a couple of 16- and 17-year olds in the newspaper, about whether or not they thought lowering the age was good. And all of these kids were still at school, and thus hopefully getting at least some political education. But what about the kids who leave school with 15 and start an apprenticeship? I barely had an idea what a president was when I left secondary modern school! OK, my teacher sucked more than average, but still.)

I do also have to admit I know two people who voted for the FPÖ. One's my boss, who's a stupid git, no doubt about that. But the other is, I'm ashamed to say, a close friend. I have avoided discussing poloitics with her, as our friendship is too old, and worth too much to risk it over this, as much as it shocked me.
She claims she did it because "they're doing something for our people". But... well, I found their slogans (and the BZÖ's) absolutely horrifying.
And the election results made me physically sick.

He's haunting me, I swear! I didn't hear about it until late on Saturday night - Mama wasn't home, and she's the one who always has the radio on, and at night, I was talking to a friend on the phone, and she mentioned he'd died, and I was so sure she was joking!
Anyway, then we said goodbye and I sat back down at the compy and turned on the music again, and out of about 600 songs, the first was "Strangers in the night" by the Landstreich, which is a quite funny song about a policeman or something talking to an illegal immigrant. And one line is, "Wüst leicht zum Haida (do you want to go to Haider)?", and you can hear the audience laughing in the background.

Creepy.

And then I turned on my desk lamp, and it went *pop* and sparks came out of it.

It took about an hour for my heartbeat to slow down.

Skeeter, you're talking to the Austrian members of the board here (amongst others of us from far-flung corners).  It is a very good idea to keep in mind that Tad's site has a world-wide membership. Overt American centrism is gauche at best.

It is also a very good idea to keep Tad's wishes for this board in mind. They are clearly posted in the introduction on the Index page. "Watching language" isn't restricted to cursing; being crude and rude in any way will be frowned upon here. "Show respect." "There's only one rule that I know of, babies -- 'God damn it, you've got to be kind.'"

i'm just flabbergasted that after OUR last 8 years, any of us would have the audacity to judge another country's culture by the quality of their elected government!

lian wrote:

I have found that Austrian and German women are among the least friendly and most elitist than most women of other nations

So magnanimous of you to be putting us in our place.

*confirms her ELITISM by pointing and laughing*

;P sorry SS, couldn't resist! XD

*flees*

You're perfectly fine, lian. No apologies needed!

If Skeeter persists on introducing himself to these boards by being offensive (not just this topic in evidence I'm afraid), he will find out just exactly how elitist and un-friendly -this- Texan woman can be.   *unpacks Smite button of Doom*

I have a feeling he won't be around here much longer, if at all.

Pathetic, really.