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So, given the inauthenticity, the jingoism, the sheer grossness – but also the undeniable appeal of a good photo-op – maybe it’s time we looked beyond the sausage for a new edible symbol of democracy. For what it’s worth, I quite like the idea of a cake stall that only sells goods emblazoned with former leaders’ faces. They could have pun-heavy names so that everyone feels embarrassed, and the pictures could be extreme close-ups so that everyone feels uncomfortable. They’d represent equality of feeling, and – as they moved from plate to mouth to stomach – the peaceful, delicious transfer of power.
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Alas, until this proposal becomes Instagrammable, we are stuck with the sausage. When I vote on Saturday, with my vegetarian children in tow, I will do so in an overwhelmingly left-wing electorate. The sausages are as likely to be vegan as they are unidentified animal, and they will even be given the dignity of spending their last minutes in a solid state on a separate grill from their meaty cousins. My husband and I will wait in line, side-eyeing the gun-nut candidate while our children punch each other. We will cast our votes and come out into a school courtyard thick with the smell of burning, floppy, meat sticks (always so much stronger than the mushed-up vegetable tubes). We will not stop for them because they are wrong, revolting and fake.
That evening, we’ll watch the election unfold and bear witness as other human floppy meat sticks vie for the title of prime minister – a spectacle that will feel both deeply appropriate and deeply shameful.
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