These days blue hair will mark you out as a convinced Corbynista
Any politician eager to demonstrate their virtue would, of course, agree that stereotypes are dreadful. Perhaps they might even throw in a shiver of disgust, if they are having an am-dram day.
In private, however, they are constantly on the lookout for clues that might reveal your politics. Witness the anonymous minister quoted this week lamenting that: “If you knock on a door and they have books on their shelves, you can be pretty sure these days they’re not voting Tory.”
The parties search for clever computers capable of reading voters’ minds, hoping that by crossreferencing your monthly avocado spending with your enthusiasm for cat pictures on Facebook they can discover your views on fiscal policy. Their strategists derive catchy names for demographic categories, from Blair’s Mondeo Man to Cameron’s identification of target voters by TV programme.
Political campaigners have long tried to use stereotype and anecdote to identify the same sort of shortcuts on the cheap. Every canvasser has their own favoured indicator.
Some people take heart or abandon hope on the basis of cat or dog, size of pet, flash car or family car (or both), lovingly tended garden or minimalist art rockery. Any glimpsed newspaper, breakfast cereal or wellies will be filed away for pondering.
The late Paddy Ashdown invented the Jack Russell Protocol, which held that “everyone who owned a Jack Russell was a Liberal voter”. He even reported encountering a Jack Russell/ dachshund cross whose owner was undecided, but half planning to vote Liberal. Admittedly, the effect seemed to have faded by 1997, when just such a terrier attempted to bite him at the polling station.
During the EU referendum, my fellow Vote Leave activists walked with confidence up to houses flying an England flag for the football, just as Emily Thornberry infamously found such patriotic displays so shocking.
The difficulty is that voters have a habit of changing what they think and how they live, so even accurate stereotypes eventually become obsolete.
Blue hair, once shorthand for ladies of a certain age who formed the fearsome backbone of many a Conservative Association, has become a warning sign that you are about to get caught in a debate with a convinced Corbynite.
In suburban London, Tories used to lament the fact that their voters took longer to canvass because they had to walk up and down seemingly endless pebble driveways, only to adjust their expectations as New Labour’s largesse propelled public sector managers into ever swankier houses.
Conservative activists who previously knew which were “good” streets and which carried the risk of a punch on the nose find themselves surprised to discover the two reversed, particularly since Brexit.
Suddenly, million-pound houses send them scurrying back down the path, while estates that previously could only be leafleted safely at 5am now offer a warm welcome, admittedly combined with awkward incidents of mistaking fist-bumps for handshakes.
Stereotypes are wrong, every politician will agree. But give them a glance at your front door, into your recycling bin or at your bookshelves, and they’ll have a damned good go at guessing whether you’re going to vote for them.