Election surveys ‘massage’ voters’ minds—Gordon

Senator Richard Gordon slammed the survey conducted by Pulse Asia, a social research institution. At a forum held just the other day in Holy Cross of Davao College about the poll automation in the offing, Mr. Gordon, who is not one of those preferred presidential candidates per Pulse Asia survey, said that surveys like the one conducted by Pulse Asia tend to “massage the minds” of the voters to vote for those whose names always bob up in surveys.

On March 12, Pulse Asia released its survey results regarding the May 2010 elections. Sampling 1,200 adults, aging 18 years old and above, the nationwide survey conducted between February 2 to 15, yields the following results.

Instead of choosing our leaders on the basis of valid criteria, disregarding irrelevant considerations, popularity becomes the name of the game, Mr. Gordon said.

What happens when popularity becomes the basis of choosing a leader, Mr. Gordon said, is that important issues such as track record and performance and qualifications–which are more important than popularity–do not take a center stage. For if the candidate is popular, it doesn’t mean he is a good leader. Far from it, Mr. Gordon said.

Prof. Randy David, a professor of sociology at University of the Philippines and columnist of PDI, finds this popularity as “the main factor” in our political system. As opposed to the system in the USA where issues are debated and discussed, and visions articulated, “in our system…it’s the other way around—mass appeal or celebrity status (or “winnability”) not only comes first, it is the main factor,” Prof. David said. “The political program becomes no more than an afterthought, a catalogue of sound bites with no internal coherence.”

“When issues take the backseat — qualification, competence, political record, personal history, and political vision also become peripheral,” Prof. David adds. “The whole system gets fixated with popularity.”

As a parting words, Mr. Gordon urged the audience, mostly college students, to be the master of their vote, to think. Then, he quoted Rene Descartes who said, “I think, therefore I am.”

The forum was organized by the Political Science and Mass Communications students.