There's trouble in paradise on We The People, the White House's experimental crowdsourced petition platform. A new petition has been started to directly address the government's apparent disinterest and dismissive attitude toward popular petitions.

We The People started earlier this year to let anyone create an official petition and collect digital signatures. Any petition that reached 25,000 votes within a month would be reviewed by appropriate and top-level policy-makers. However, some users have complained that the platform is more about letting the public vent than creating substantive reforms.

Enter the petition entitled: We demand a vapid, condescending, meaningless, politically safe response to this petition. The slightly passive aggressive petition lampoons what signers say is the government's standard practice of responding to successful petitions:

Since these petitions are ignored apart from an occasional patronizing and inane political statement amounting to nothing more than a condescending pat on the head, we the signers would enjoy having the illusion of success. Since no other outcome to this process seems possible, we demand that the White House immediately assign a junior staffer to compose a tame and vapid response to this petition, and never attempt to take any meaningful action on this or any other issue. We would also like a cookie.

The government has certainly answered more outlandish petitions (ahem, aliens), but the Vapid Petition actually seems well on its way to breaking the 25,000 signature requirement. The petition has more than 9,700 signatures since it started on Nov. 4.

Aside from the petition's clearly sarcastic tone, it legitimately speaks to a wide-spread frustration with the We The People platform. It will be interesting to see what happens if it gains more than 25,000 votes by Dec. 3 — the petition's cut-off — and the government is obligated to respond. To its credit, the White House has left the petition unaltered (to our knowledge) and voters can still use all of the site's social features to promote the petition.

What do you think? If you were the White House, would you fight fire with fire and deliver a deliberately mocking, vapid and condescending response or take the high road? Any chance on that cookie?

Image courtesy of Flickr, El Bibliomata