Ned Yeung<p>I have some serious concerns about the upcoming municipal elections in Edmonton, thanks to the meddling of Danielle Smith to introduce "political parties" into our formerly independent civic elections.</p><p>Make no mistake about it, the whole purpose of political parties in municipal elections is to introduce "big party politics" with big money backing, allowing one party to dominate the sphere and push out independent candidates who were elected by individual merit alone.</p><p>Check out this bot-like behavior for an example. We know how Conservative parties are already trolling every City of Edmonton government post with vitriol and hate, especially on anything claiming any kind of inclusion, from cycling infrastructure to acknowledgement of 2SLGBTQIA+ or Indigenous people, to be a "waste of money", backing that with the nastiest comment towards the real people with real needs who are getting some sort of recognition for their struggles.</p><p>With political parties in municipal elections, our coming campaign period is going to be flooded with party politics drowning out independent voices with their loudest, scariest, most divisive politics. This is going to be a nightmare, and will very likely destroy the currently left-leaning City Council dynamic we have from good politicians who were elected by the people because they represented the needs people have. The next council is likely to be elected based on mass smear campaigns and party politics backed by deep financial resources, drowning out the voices of the independent politicians with something useful to say.</p><p>ie, PACE is already calling our city council "radical" and accusing them of "sham engagement". This is political spin for "spending public funds on public interests," and "recognizing marginalized folk". Many aren't knowledgeable enough to recognize these "big party" spins.</p><p>I am very afraid.</p><p>That is why Danielle Smith doesn't want municipal politics to be independent, because politicians elected on personal merit are inherently left-leaning, just like in science and research, which is why she chose to shut down funding to academics if their research doesn't result in enough "Conservative views", artificially forcing her ideologies when they don't stand up to academic scrutiny.</p><p>You can't just force bias because you don't like the results of the scientific process, or the democratic process!</p><p><a href="https://beige.party/tags/yeg" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>yeg</span></a> <a href="https://beige.party/tags/abpoli" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">#<span>abpoli</span></a></p>