When people talk about dog whistles in politics, they mean ugly messages – usually racist – that only some voters can hear. It’s metaphorically inexact: we can all hear them, but only some of us come when we’re called. All elections emit a different kind of noise, equally audible, even less likely to be put into words. A “what’s this really all about?” noise. In 2019, it was “all politics is futile, circular, boring, childish, and this is your chance to walk away”. Back then, it was the saddest subliminal electioneering I’d ever heard, but of course that was before the 2022 local elections, in which the take-home is: “We’re terrible. They’re terrible. Everybody’s essentially terrible. You’re probably also terrible.”
So, sure, Downing Street had parties while people in hospitals died alone; but have you heard about the opposition? They had beer. Pointless to dive in any deeper; try playing that argument out, and saying, “By April 2021, the rules were completely different …” Before you even get to the end of the sentence, you feel besmirched by your own pedantry, lost in a new, faceless terrain, where nobody’s behaviour matters because everybody’s is the same. And, besides, nobody obeyed the rules all the time, because the rules were stupid. This is an unappealing new consensus, that sensible people saw civic duty all along for what it was: a mug’s game.
I’ve heard callers on BBC Radio 4’s Any Answers? argue that everyone watches porn at work, and maybe we should all grow up a little bit; commentators insisting that, hey, politics is bad, but wait until you hear about sexual harassment in the world of finance. Which is worse between a Tory MP who’s a convicted sex offender, deferring his resignation until the last possible minute, and a Labour MP about whom someone once made a sexual and sexist insinuation? Trick question! Neither is worse or better, in the world of mad equivalence where everyone is corrupt because, who knows, original sin, maybe?
I hold out a hope, though, that this won’t fly in local elections; there’s something about words such as “transport links” and “recycling” that splashes cold water on the face of fevered notions, and makes you think, “Wait a second … I’m not sure I am that bad.”
Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist
