“Why were Labour voters not "shy" when Polled a few weeks ago ?”
It could be because of attitudes such as these, Mikey:
“One of the first things I did after seeing the depressing election news this morning was check to see which of my Facebook friends ‘like’ the pages of the Conservatives or David Cameron, and unfriend them. I don’t want to be friends with racists, sexists, or homophobes. And I don’t want to be friends with Conservatives either.”
(Rebecca Roache, Royal Holloway University, writing of her disappointment and dismay at the election result.)
“I was surprised when I first heard that statistic. [that Labour has a smaller core following than the Conservatives]. Perhaps it is all the more surprising when we consider that voting conservative is largely socially unacceptable.”
(Dr Samuel Furse, post doctoral researcher at the University of Utrecht)
“Part of the reason for this shyness, it has to be said, is that people don’t like other people shouting “Tory scum” at them or vandalising their cars. And being a conservative, both big and small-C, has become so socially unacceptable that about one in eight Conservative voters routinely lie about it even when they are guaranteed anonymity by polling companies,..”
(The Catholic Herald)
“Right now I feel ashamed to be English. Ashamed to belong to a country that has clearly identified itself as insular, self-absorbed and apparently caring so little for the most vulnerable people among us.”
(Canon Giles Fraser, former chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral, a position from which he resigned in protest at plans to remove forcibly the anti-capitalist protesters who had set up a ‘shanty town’ camp outside, writing in the Grauniad following the election results).
So there you have it. Voting Tory should make one ashamed of one’s country, is socially unacceptable and puts one on par with racists, sexists and homophobes. No real need the, to ask why some people are reluctant to make their political leanings known. Perhaps you could point me to some similar comments about people who vote Labour.