I think most people take a political side without conscious thought. Once they are there, they are stuck because politics makes people stupid.
I know people who are genuinely better people than their politics would indicate. But, since politics makes them stupid, they are incapable of critical thinking about what they are supporting. Again, they are stuck.
They've supported a side, and they don't want to (or can't) admit they were wrong. They can't change sides. They certainly can't think outside the government box.
Some of them are shocked when a politician from "their team" acts like a member of "the other party", but all I see is a politician acting like a politician. I'm not shocked by that any more than I am shocked to see a moth acting like a moth. When Trump acts like a Democrat, it's because he's always been a Democrat, and Democrats are statists just like Republicans are, not because he is acting against his nature.
People don't act against their nature- they show you what their nature is by how they act.
I want to tell these people that their favorite politician has more in common with the politician they hate most than with themselves. But they wouldn't hear it if I told them. Politics makes them deaf to spoken reason and illiterate to written words.
It's not necessarily because they are bad people. They've been brainwashed. They've been tricked. Politics has made them stupid. They are trapped in that death spiral, and there is no escape unless they pull themselves out of it.
All I can do is be there to grab their hand if they realize the position they are in and reach out for help. Otherwise, you can't rescue those who don't admit they're in trouble.
Tips are nice.
"Once they are there, they are stuck because politics makes people stupid."
ReplyDeleteI'm not as much of an Internet/social media catastrophist as some people are, but IMO that's been a big factor in the "being stuck."
Prior to most people having Internet access, you could be wrong -- even in really vile ways -- about something, but leave that behind unless you were very, very famous. You could change your mind. You could become a better person. Heck, if you even moved from one town to another, nobody in the new place would probably know who you used to be. Fresh start.
But the Internet is 1) everywhere and 2) forever. Once you've said X on it, anyone who's interested can find out about it 15 years later and 1,500 miles away. And if X is bad or embarrassing or useful to people looking for something to be upset about, X will come back to haunt you no matter how much you've changed.
And that tells people to just dig in wherever they are and defend X to the hilt forever because they're just stuck with X no matter what they do and trying to abandon X makes them look weak.
I'm sure that's a big part of it. But the internet helps people learn new things, too. And when you learn new things, the smart thing to do is to change your mind based on the new information. Sure, there's always the option to not learn anything, but I hate that option for myself.
DeleteThe more I learn, the more anarchist I become. My evolution is here in this blog for anyone to see and judge and try to use against me if they wish. Some of my old posts make me cringe- but there they are.
The points in this good post that most resonate with me are the following:
ReplyDelete“I think most people take a political side without conscious thought.”
I find that ‘most’ people, those I call herd beasts, take not just political sides but essentially everything they believe in an attempt to mimic what they see around them. They are slavish social adopters and rarely if ever engage in independent conscious thought. Responsibility and culpability are generally shirked by the herd. They go along to get along.
“People don't act against their nature- they show you what their nature is by how they act.”
And this is never more evident than in those who lack an intrinsic individual nature and are just a reflection of their social milieu.
“….and there is no escape unless they pull themselves out of it.”
Regrettably true. This has been a realization that has been the hardest fact for me to accept in life. I find it extremely unlikely if not impossible that anyone can be changed or talked out of their inherent nature. Your own experience in life may serve to accomplish this but it can only occur from internal not external efforts. Some are assisted to achieve this change by the impression of external example but only because the seed of the change existed inside them awaiting the cultivation and nourishing by the external example.