I am a very strong liberal. I have my ways of thinking what “should” and “shouldn’t” happen with the government, the economy, society, etc. It would be great for me if everyone else thought exactly like me, but unfortunately, not everyone does. This is why extremes don’t work in modern politics.
President Bush and the Republican Party are a prime example. They were extreme, and infuriated a lot of democrats, this in turn forced the republicans to retaliate and become more extreme themselves, which in turn forced the democrats to become even more extreme, and now there is a deep segregation of beliefs and most interactions are negative and anger based. Now what happens when you get these parties together in congress? Nothing gets done because they can never come to an agreement.
The easiest way to retaliate against an opponent is to get angry at them and oversimplify things. This is amplified through the media. The truth is, there is not such extreme political segregation among society as the media portrays. A Stanford University political scientist by the name of Morris Fiorina observed that the media finds the most extreme people in society to back up their beliefs, when in reality, all of America is not that polarized. We have our significant differences in social and moral issues like abortion and gay marriage, but when it comes down to economic specifics, the extremes are not commonly seen. Since politicians are under the harsh magnifying glass of the media, we are only going to hear the things the media wants us to hear, i.e, the things that make us mad.
Sure, I’d love it if we all agreed to raise taxes and cut military spending, but we don’t. In order to run a country properly, everyone needs to be involved. This means the country must have leaders that are not extreme and are willing to pull from both sides since the only way to make everyone happy is to include everyone’s views. However, modern politics and the media have made it so we can’t just “meet in the middle”. Political parties have become more focused on making decisions that will give their party a good reputation among likeminded people, and that will make the other party look bad, rather than focusing on what the country as a whole actually needs.
If a candidate who swung back and forth between parties on political issues ran, they would never get elected, or even nominated, because people are afraid of someone who “can’t make up their mind”, but do they realize it’s the only way things will ever get done in the government? Our government has become more of the two parties bickering and bashing each other simply because it’s the “norm” in their party, and therefore the true care and attention for what society needs has been lost. When I say society, I don’t just mean the groups of people that political parties and their accompanying candidates try to appeal to, I mean EVERYONE. Democrats, republicans, liberals, conservatives, men, women, majorities, minorities, dogs, and cats of all kinds.
But what can we do about this problem? Are we going to go on for the rest of eternity with the same uninformative, nasty, party-bashing politics we have today?
No.
We abandon the parties. We have taken the labels “Democrat” and “Republican” and turned them into labels of lifestyle, far beyond political beliefs. Until a person can clearly articulate their individual political beliefs and values, they become a political lamb who conforms to the beliefs that “the other side” is wrong, simply because they’re the other side. Even worse, the political lambs check out of the system entirely because it’s “too confusing” or “not important” or “doesn’t apply to me”. We all know one of those people. Since we’re so distracted with our labels, why not just take them away to help everyone focus on the raw facts of the issues and important decisions involved with politics?
You may be thinking that this would cause complete turmoil in our political world, but think about it: right now if you’re a democrat you will probably vote for the democrat just because he’s a democrat, and not even consider the republican candidate, because since he’s a republican, so he’s probably wrong. What if people didn’t know the labels of the candidates, and were therefore forced to research where they stand and make their decision based on weather or not they agree with their fundamentals.
There would obviously be trends between the “democratic” and “republican” candidates and the people who vote for either, but it would help society get away from the beliefs forced upon them by their parties, and to get away from the political bashing of one party versus another. This in turn would help open society’s eyes and force them to make decisions of what THEY think is right for the country, not what THEIR PARTY says is right for the country. Although abolishing political labels immediately is not realistic, the idea of shifting society towards not caring about the labels is what can motivate people to think for themselves.
Think for yourself, vote for yourself, and break down the walls of political segregation; the blinders on the eyes of our democracy.
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