Have they all retired from politics and given up on their country?
And
And for the first time ever had a 2nd thought about the wisdom of it, entertaining the possibility of a brick through the window. Or something unpleasant through the letterbox.
Put these two statements together.
My previous MP was Tory. He was a liberal conservative (voted remain) and a half decent constituency MP tbh. Better than the waste of space that is our current Labour one.
He very reluantly stood again in 2017 but had said privately that he wouldn't stand again because of the abuse he'd endured.
I didn't know him personally but I did have a mutual friend who had said about what had been happening to him.
He had moved out of the constituency due to the issues he was having. His house had been targetted on several occasions, including one time dog poo being put through his letter box. He was, away in London with work so his wife and kids had to deal with it.
This was BEFORE things have got even more polarised.
He was apparently very relieved he had lost (he didn't do a huge amount of campaigning in 2017 as his heart really was no longer in it).
I think its easy to criticise people who have quit politics and have 'abandoned their country'. I don't see the people criticising, putting themselves (and their families) on the line to stand instead of them either.
I have sympathy for those who have done it and don't feel they can take anymore of the abuse and the mental stress of it all tbh.
It doesn't make it right or better. It just highlights the problems even more where no one is willing to put themselves on the line because of the risks involved. That really is the sign of a country where authoritarism and political violence is a significant and legitmate problem.
Would I stand in my own constituency? Hell no. Would I be happy about DH standing in my own constituency? We'd be looking at divorce.
Apart from that there is the issue that people of the calibre that we'd ideally like to stand could earn more in other careers and have a better work/life balance than working parttime in London, having to run two homes, and the long parliamentary hours even when you take expenses into consideration. I know people say £80,000 is a lot of money - but at London salaries and given the job, it really isn't comparitively speaking. Its a lot compared with the average salary across the country, but its not compared with a London salary in a professional field.
The bottom line is you have to be pretty ideologically driven to even want to consider standing now. The profession is only going to attract the hard core militants for that reason.