When Civic Participation Means Shaming A Non-Voter’s Kid

This video, “Playground” [YouTube, Facebook] makes quite an impression. It shows a scene of schoolyard bullying but takes the side of the jeering, taunting mob — in the name of voting. It is one of a series of 30 second videos put out by a group calling itself Civic Innovation Works, encouraging a vote in the general election on November 8 and seemingly intended as public service announcements. The others in the series appear to be similar in message, but lacking in this one’s outrageousness (although one does present a fantasy about publicly shaming a non‐​voter). 


On the off chance that Civic Innovation Works was someone’s idea of an elaborate parody I looked them up. I found that Fenton, the well‐​known progressive/“social change” public relations agency, takes credit for one of the other videos in the series.


So it would look as if they are on the level. It is almost as if they were trying with “Playground” to convince viewers that electoral politics makes people worse.